Jakarta – Indonesian Human Rights Watch (Imparsial) senior researcher Al Araf has revealed that there are around 2,500 active TNI (Indonesian Military) soldiers holding civilian positions based on information from the National Resilience Institute (Lemhanas) in 2023.
This was conveyed by Al Araf during a public hearing (RDPU) at the House of Representatives (DPR) Commission I discussing the Draft Law on the TNI (RUU TNI) on Tuesday March 4.
"Data from the TNI's Babinkum [Indonesian Military Legal Development Agency] states that when I was discussing this at the Lemhanas in 2023, there were 2,500 soldiers occupying civilian positions, this, please crosscheck this again because I used this data when I was doing a presentation at the Babinkum at that time", Al Araf said in his presentation.
He said that there have been violations of Law Number 34/2004 on the TNI in these cases because Article 47 of the TNI Law only specifies a small number of civil positions that can be occupied by active TNI members.
"But now there are many in various ministries, in my opinion this is a basic violation of the TNI Law", Al Araf said.
The doctor from Brawijaya University reminded Commission I that as a partner of the TNI it cannot remain silent. The climax of these violations, the most controversial case, was when Major Teddy Indra Wijaya was appointed to the position of Cabinet Secretary.
"And the most controversial thing was the appointment of Major Teddy as Cabinet Secretary, which was then changed so it came under the Military Secretary because the Cabinet Secretary's position was placed under the military", he said.
Al Araf added that the negative implications of this are that it is disrupting the civil bureaucratic levels and systems. He admitted that he had many friends among state civil servants (ASN) who have been hampered by the TNI officers holding position in civil institutions.
"The presence of active military, active police, clearly disrupts the bureaucracy, clearly disrupts the merit system", he said.
"Aside from violating the law, this will also weakens professionalism. Don't pull the military back into civilian positions, don't tempt them into that realm. Because it will damage our constitutional system", added Al Araf. (fra/fra/thr)
[Translated by James Balowski. The original title of the article was "Imparsial di Rapat RUU TNI: 2.500 Prajurit Isi Jabatan Sipil Pada 2023".]
