After Law No.6 on Villages was endorsed, a worry emerged that villages would be the same as local, provincial, and regency/city government facing corruption issues. The corruption might occur in some areas like Village Fund Allocation (ADD) from APBN/APBD, Cash-Village Land (TKD) through village investment trade, illegal levy of massive certification as KTP making, and social fund or social aid.
The aforementioned statement was uttered by Chief of Indonesia Advocate Association (IKADIN) Prof. Dr. Todung Mulya Lubis, S.H., LLM in a public discussion with the topic of “Corruption Potential on Village Law”. The event was preceded by inauguration of Regional Management Council (DPD) organizers of IKADIN Yogyakarta 2015-2019. It took place in meeting hall of A.R. Fachruddin A Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta (UMY) on Saturday (28/02).
According to Todung, to avoid the corruption potential of Village Law, it needed creating a derivative of Village Law. The derivative would be very essential in order that the village have obvious guidelines. However, it needed commitment of government to prevent abuse of law vacuum due to incomplete regulation of rural administration.
“The reason why the derivative of Village Law is significant is that regulations of Village Law derivative could not be generalized for all villages in Indonesia. Each village has different condition. It could be noticed from national examination that many inexpediencies caused a lot of complaints and failures in some areas,” he said.
Todung added the other reason is that corruption is a power monopoly and discretion (freedom of making decision on every situation). It ensues since lack of accountability of a governmental system. He argues that it underlay the corruption.
“I would like to deliver several factors which might cause abuse of village budget. They are incomplete structures of rural administration, lack of coordination and monitoring of planning or implementation, the absence of financial management system, low human resources, administrative and law punishment system which could not limit the realization,” he explained.
On the other hand, Dean of Law Faculty (FH) of UMY Dr. Trisno Raharjo, S.H., M.Hum. conveyed that his party as a representative of higher education would provide coaching for village chief to manage village finance well and unlimited coaching on rural regulations. Moreover, they would be facilitators and provide consultation for the village.
“Empowerment by Muhammadiyah-affiliated universities aims at enhancing ability of the village to coordinate, provide coaching on planning, financial management system, and understanding of rural administration management. Thus, it would raise awareness of village rights and obligations of proposing and using village budget, as well as writing report and being responsible in audit of BPK,” asserted Trisno who is also Director of Education and Training of IKADIN DIY.
After the discussion, to reinforce cooperation and monitoring of rural administration, IKADIN and Law Faculty of UMY signed memorandum of understanding to strengthen the role of monitoring on the implementation of Village Law as the form of their community service.
