Behind the Glitz of the 2010 Budget
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2010: End of Year Comments: A Year of Political Posturing a Budget Verging on the Unconstitutional
2010 was the first year of President Susilo Bambang Yudoyono SBY’s second term of office following his re-election in 2009. In this second term, SBY should be able to be more resolute in his
espousal of good budget policies and should not accord any priority to maintaining his political image. The principal emphases in the 2010 State budget APBN 2010 were that it should promote
―national economic recovery and boost community welfare‖. But all that turned out to be mere rhetoric. The reality was that the budget was further removed than ever from the mandate of Article
23 of the Consititution that national budgets ―
shall be implemented in an open and accountable manner in order to best attain the prosperity of the p
eople‖.
Instead of being used to promote the public interest, 40.7 of the 2010 APBN was consumed by routine expenditure on the bureaucracy and top echelons
of the civil service. Furthermore, Rp 162.6 trillion of that 40.7 was spent on civil service costs, Rp 19.5 trillion on official travel and Rp 153.6 trillion on payment of interest on loans or loan
repayments.
Following are Seknas FITRA’s overall comments on the nation’s budget performance in 2010.
1. Extra Remuneration for Civil Servants: Bureaucratic Reform Losing its Way
The central government’s panacea for the elimination of corruption from the bureaucracy—the payment of extra remuneration
remunerasi
—has not worked, as is clearly demonstrated by the case of Gayus Tambunan, an official within the Directorate-General of Taxation in the Ministry
of Finance. Also contributing to the failure of bureaucratic reform —which remains a mere
catchcry —was the central government’s predilection for establishing special teams within the
Presidential Palace and for appointing an array of deputy ministers. All this had the effect of creating a bureaucracy rich in structure but poor in functionality and efficiency. The additional Rp
34.7 trillion spent on the bureaucracy in 2010 did nothing to enhance the quality of its service.
2. The Race to Travel: More Money in the Pocket
