July 2, 2024
JAKARTA – For people who are keen to nurture wisdom, birthdays serve as a moment to reflect rather than an excuse to party. This is especially true for the 436,000-strong National Police, which celebrates its 78th anniversary today.
The most recent survey conducted by Indikator Politik Indonesia on the performance of state institutions revealed that public trust in the police reached 75.3 percent. This represents an improvement from a self-destructive image created by a murder case involving a two-star general in 2022.
But the police cannot rest with the survey results, which may not show the entire picture. The public is demanding more from the police, which carry the constitutional mandate to protect the people and maintain law and order.
There are instances in which the performance of the police force has yet to live up to expectations. Petty officers demanding or accepting bribes from traffic regulation offenders has remained ubiquitous. We also often find the police launching investigations only after a case goes viral on social media.
The gravest concern of all, however, is the use of force that appears to have continued to characterize our police, which contradicts its claim about internal reforms.
The National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) and Amnesty International Indonesia have recently released data showing that torture remains common practice in the police. Komnas HAM recorded 176 reports of torture cases committed by police officers during interrogation of suspects or prisoners between Jan. 1, 2020, and June 24 of this year. Amnesty International Indonesia found 15 cases of torture between 2021 and 2022, a number that doubled in the 2023-2024 period.
Indonesia ratified the United Nations Convention Against Torture in 1998, but the data indicates that the international convention, which has been adopted in the national legal system, is not well enforced, or at least has not been accepted as a shared value, especially among officers in the field. To make matters worse, those who have committed torture or used violence have largely enjoyed impunity.
The recent alleged torture of a teenager in Padang, West Sumatra will serve as another test of the police’s commitment to the UN convention and internal reforms in general. The police’s internal affairs department has found 17 officers guilty of excessive use of violence when handling 18 students allegedly involved in a brawl on June 9, but the police have denied responsibility for the death of AM, one of the students.
The schoolboy’s body was found under a bridge in the city with suspicious blunt impact injuries to the abdomen and chest. The police said AM broke his ribs after jumping into the river as he tried to escape from arrest. West Sumatra Police chief Insp. Gen. Suharyono said AM was not among the students arrested.
The Padang tragedy is yet another reminder that the police need to improve mechanisms to prevent torture and excessive use of force, or else put the hard-won democracy in jeopardy.
The practice of impunity and a culture of violence within the police institution is perhaps a manifestation of systemic and structural problems that have been left unaddressed since the reform movement in 1998. The reforms, which separated the police from the armed forces, have instead transformed the police into a powerful institution that unfortunately inherited the culture of violence, which was then institutionalized as a working method that is considered effective in enforcing the law.
The decline of Indonesian democracy looks set to exacerbate as the House of Representatives, clearly with prior consent of the government, is tabling draft amendments of the Broadcasting Law and the Police Law that will grant the police the authority to control the country’s cyber world. To fight cybercrime, police will be allowed to block, disconnect or slow down access to cyberspace for security purposes, but the new power can be used against critics or the opposition.
The police still have a lot to do to prove their critics wrong. Their 78th anniversary will be a perfect time to start.