Sunday, August 14, 2016

Corruption and Culture: Two intertwined issues

This might sound socially cheesy, but it's getting hurt to realize that the society where I'm living has taken for granted the existence of nation's biggest 'cancer', corruption. 

It's not that we are weak or don't have enough power in terms of creating and spreading the paradigm of anti-corruption. I think we have more than enough power to express and do whatever it is to fight that. And better yet, we have the legal instruments such as Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi (KPK) and those other NGOs and movements that are constantly working for the same concern. But as far as we go, nothing has really changed. Corruption is still there, it gets even worse. So where is the so-called power to fight the corruption we have had gone? Departing from that question, I have an argument that, as pathetic as it sounds, we (Indonesians) actually love and nurture the culture of corruption. 

Let me explain why I have such argument...

Unlike in a totalitarian country, Indonesia provides its people with so much more freedom to expose the act of corruption that happens all over the country with no regards to fear of being detained or silently assassinated by the cruel leaders whose dirty businesses are afraid from being revealed. (lol, btw, i'm just kidding about that assassination stuff. Some people were actually killed for exposing corruption in this country).

Do all the media coverage help?

That is proven by the fact that we have developed such a strong perspective and a collective spiritual chant among Indonesians to "SAY NO TO CORRUPTION!" Not only are we seeing this kind of spirit showcased in our mainstream media both printed press and television. But we are also developing this into even more viral as we have thousands of anti-corruption related events held all over the country every year. The spirit is so real. But again, the question is...where's the outcome going? Do all the media coverage and those seminars really help us to eradicate corruption from our society? I don't really think so.

I argue that, the more we have our media covering it, the more we see corruption as a common thing that happens in our country, like for example...earthquakes. As I said in the very first paragraph of this article, we do take corruption for granted not because we surrender to it, and not because we have no power and instrument whatsoever to fight it, but it's because the mindset that we have thinks that maybe there's actually no possible way for us to kick it out from our culture. That maybe God has gifted this country with a notorious title to be known by the world, and there's nothing we can do to change it. Or, in the most optimistic way of thinking I can say...maybe we always think that there's somebody else in this country who cares enough to do all the heroic sending corruptors to jail-job for us. With that being said, all the media coverage will be just an advantage and a useful tool for the corruptors to naturalize their act. And those anti-corruption events that seem to tell us how terrible the sin that will be gotten for doing corruption will be just some kind of normative bill that needs to be paid off.

The comforting old culture

The more sad thing is that, in some cases, people do realize that there is an act of corruption happening within a system. But instead of doing things that could possibly stop the act, some will just tend to let it happen because an act of corruption can seem to make things become more simple than how it should be.

Take for example the story that I got from the local people where I stay for the next a couple of weeks ahead for the community service program. These people paid some amount of money just to cut some legal processes with the local corrupt government in order allow them to open tourism business in a particular area. They told me they knew that there's actually another way they could go with, but they chose to bribe. I think this happened not because they intentionally want to embrace the corruption, but it seems to me that they see bribing has effectively simplified all the complicated processes they supposed to go through into one simple principle, "Benefit for all." Hence corruption is loved. Hence corruption is nurtured.

In the other hand, I also think that maybe all of this corruption culture in this country has something to do with the mentality we possess as the citizens of a developing country where economy is a crucial problem for almost everyone in the country. That kind of problem that's found in a developing country like Indonesia usually begins with the idea to get a better life by instant profit, to have a high class lifestyle with low income, to accept mistakes and see it as a common sense, and to think only for short term solutions. 

The other thing that I would try to deliver is that let us not be naive by blaming people up there in the government to stop being corrupt. I say that we should together revolutionize our mentality as Indonesian citizens to fully eradicate this corruption culture out from our system of society. That is why education exists. That is why the instrument exists. And that is also why freedom of press exists. We as the citizens should realize that we actually have that power to fight it as long as we want to leave the old culture in our society. That we should also realize if we will always be part of this nation's backwardness by staying in the same culture.

Let's do whatever we can do to contribute to the effort!






2 comments:

  1. Maa sha Allah! What a wonderful read!
    Interestingly, we do have such glaring similarities. The Tausugs of Sulu are having the same mindset of looking for the "shortcut" even they know that it is against the law. After all, they would argue, we all benefit from it anyway. Such a painful reality that is.

    I totally agree with your conclusion that we should not just keep on blaming our leaders from being corrupt and stopping from there. it should rather start from US CITIZENS: We start living and leading an honest life and be an example to the next generations, lest we let these things become a norm and end up repeating the cycle again and again...

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    1. Hai Ahmad, how's life? It's been awhile since the last time we hung out in Manila.. Hope everything's doing great right there. And thank you for giving your response and perspective about this article. Indeed, every elements of the society should be actively involved in the effort of eradicating corruption. Maybe this piece of writing did not really mean that much, but I hope that it could, at least, raise a little awareness.

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