PEOPLE NOT AFRAID: GETTING CAUGHT IS AN ACCIDENT

 

  ANTS AFTER SUGAR

 

Corruption is heavy stuff so let’s lighten with an old Indonesian joke:  A farmer’s goat is stolen so he reports to the police.  They’ll investigate if he pays.  The fee is a cow.  The theft is neither solved nor the bovines returned.

Transparency International’s just released Global Corruption Barometer checked 17 countries, including the world’s third largest democracy.  It came up with little that’s newsworthy.  As usual cops came tops.  Panting close behind were civil licensing and education services.

The mid-2020 survey canvassed 1,000 Indonesians.  A third reported they’d bribed bureaucrats to get the permits they needed.

Grand Theft Moolah is making headlines as the Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi (KPK - Corruption Eradication Commission) pounces on suspects.  The crime busters don’t need forensic investigation skills. Their targets expose themselves with lavish lifestyles posted on social media. In one swoop the KPK collected Louis Vuitton bags and other luxury goods among bundles of notes.

This month the KPK alleged Social Affairs Minister Juliari Batubara had taken at least AUD $1.5 million ‘for personal needs’. The money had been earmarked as Covid-19 food aid for the poor.

A fortnight earlier Fisheries Minister Edhy Prabowo, his wife Rosita Dewi and 17 others were arrested for allegedly pocketing bribes of Rp 9.8 billion (AUD 933,000) to issue export licences for juvenile lobsters.

During the 1999 economic crisis Rp 904 billion (AUD 87 million) was owed by three banks to the Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency.  The cash vanished. 

So did company director Djoko Tjandra aka Joe Chan on the eve of being sentenced.  Even though on an Interpol red list he came and went with the help of senior officers in the police and army, and was only snared this year.

Former vice president Jusuf Kalla told The Jakarta Post: ‘Corruption is mostly the result of the power of a signature. When you have the authority to sign anything, it will be like ants going after sugar... now people are not afraid of engaging in corruption. They just think that it is just an accident when they get caught.’

It’s easy but unwise to sneer at our neighbour holding position 85 on TI’s Corruption Perception Index ranking of 198 countries.  NZ and Denmark vie for the top spot in cleanliness – we’re 12^th.  The lack of a national anti-corruption commission may be a factor in the rating.  As school reports say:  Could do better.

Perth media have reported a case involving a senior public servant who allegedly embezzled a few million.  The charges could blow out to AUD 40 million.  In Adelaide a former magistrate is behind bars for lying over motoring fines. 

Here’s the difference: We’re still shocked while Indonesians yawn.  It’s the way business is always done. TI researcher Alvin Nicola reportedly said: ‘The culture of giving gifts, the culture of gratification, is considered normal and is made natural by many Indonesians’. President Joko Widodo huffs and puffs but the House of Graft doesn’t tumble.

Departments are unofficially classified ‘wet’ or ‘dry’.  Young bureaucrats vie to get into the first category.  This includes the police, immigration, customs and any agency which issues permits

It’s possible to do business honestly for those with excess time to kill.  Intimidating banners outside government offices warn against fraud, so the naive might assume it’s safe to enter with a wallet and exit unharmed. 

Apart from the lady’s name I vouch this yarn is true: Last month citizen ‘Sri’ was told to visit her distant birthplace to get a certificate authenticated. This disquieting news was delivered in an office where customers must present documents in foolscap folders.  The covers are stamped with an official message forbidding the payment of bribes.

Faced with a costly and near-impossible task as Covid-19 is restricting domestic travel, ‘Sri’ scribbled a note wondering if there might be another solution?  The official said nothing.  She read his body language, went to the toilet to avoid CCTV, and put two Rp 100,000 (AUD 20) bills in the folder.

He said nothing and retuned the folder with the authorised papers but not the money.  This saved her around Rp 10 million (AUD 1,000) for a round trip.

At the next office she presented staff with a cake to keep a counter open when the place was closing for an early lunch. 

It’s illegal for Australians overseas to bribe public officials, a law not in place for many foreigners doing business in Indonesia.  One way round this problem is to use agents.  I met mine in the police driving licence centre under a poster warning agents to keep out.

I was escorted straight to the boss (‘my friend’) who immediately authorised a five-year renewal.  The queue outside had hardly moved.  The cost was Rp 75,000 (AUD 8) plus the standard licence fee.

Investors impressed by Indonesian government urgings to try their luck should understand the law is also gamed.

Jakarta-based Australian lawyer and business consultant Bill Sullivan told Perth think-tank Future Directions International: ‘It is in the interests of too many people to keep the legal and court systems opaque and non-transparent, as well as overtly favourable to Indonesians and overtly disinclined to help foreigners, for the government to be too keen to take on that challenge.’

Indonesia’s place in the World Index of Ease of Doing Business (73) isn’t a statistical glitch about to be corrected.  Civil servants fear reform knowing reskilling will follow and maybe dismissals for those who don’t make the grade.  Better to keep demanding more photocopies, extra signatures, original documents, certificates, letters of recommendation and whatever else can be used to drive citizens to reach for their purses,

There are close to 4.5 million public servants in the country according to Badan Pusat Statistik (Central Statistics Agency).  About 80 per cent work in regional governments – the rest in Jakarta’s ministries and departments.

A job in the public service means a regular income, tenure, a pension and a uniform which wearers believe garners respect – though only to their faces.  Mordant humour is the way Indonesians cope, so here’s a closer:

The Republic is full of honest cops. They’re on the roads everywhere. 

‘Polisi tidur’ - sleeping policeman – is the term for road speed bumps.

Footnote: Australia is lending Indonesia $1.5 billion to help its economy bounce back from the plague.  Jakarta diplomats might care to check Facebook to see who’s flaunting high-end handbags and ensure it has the KPK on speed-dial.

First published in Pearls & Irritations, 9 November 2020:
https://johnmenadue.com/corruption-in-indonesia-ants-after-sugar/

 

 

CLEARING HURDLES, KEEPING ROADBLOCKS

                               This bus isn’t moving fast

It’s not too difficult for outsiders to get the gist of Indonesian economics.  That’s because terms, like ‘administrasi, deficit, bangkrut, fiskal’ and others have been pinched from English and tweaked.

The latest is ‘omnibus law’, a favourite with President Joko Widodo in a bid to slash and compost the vines of red tape that strangle the business landscape.  The problem is few understand the meaning so use their default setting – suspicion.  

Labour unions are opposing government reforms designed to make investors feel easier about leaving their deposits in Southeast Asia’s biggest economy.  Consolidating legislation would certainly help, though only if the public servants agree to implement.

As changes could lead to a reduction of stamping and photocopying tasks among the Republic’s almost five million bureaucrats, Widodo’s enthusiasm isn’t widely shared.

He reportedly said it would take half a century to revise each law individually, so why not make a bundle, call it an omnibus and drive it through the Parliament? 

There are more than 1,200 articles in 80 laws the President thinks need to be bashed aside by the bullbar. “Start now,’ he said. ‘It could all be done in 100 working days.’

He’s about the only person who thinks that timetable practical.   Workers fearing lower wages and loss of entitlements have been protesting, disbelieving government claims of more jobs through foreign investments. 

 Around 70 per cent of the nation’s workforce is informal; insecurity is widespread along with its twin, distrust.

The big end of town is being offered cut price tickets to jump on the omnibus.  In exchange for a comfy seat business tax will drop from 25 per cent to 20 per cent within three years.

That sounds fair enough – though only till it’s remembered that many entrepreneurs have refined the art of keeping their duties, fiscal and moral, to a minimum by sending profits overseas.  A lower rate on next to nothing is not a big inducement. 

According to the OECD ‘tax revenues are low relative to other emerging economies … (and) compliance remains a major challenge.’  Indonesia’s tax-to-GDP ratio is 12 per cent, less than half that of Australia’s.

VAT is applied where a business keeps records.  For a meal in McDonald’s, or any chrome and plastic eatery with a till, expect a tax and service charge of 21 per cent.  Use a streetfood stall or local café and there are no additions.  Cash still reigns - many shops won’t accept credit cards.

The omnibus bill is the latest bid to boost the tax take while reducing costs.  An earlier attempt thumped the nationalism drum, appealing to the megarich to repatriate the earnings they’d parked abroad in return for dropping tax avoidance prosecutions.

As patriotism is not a relative of capitalism the results were unimpressive. At the time (2017) it was reported that only 32 million were registered taxpayers and less than nine million submitted returns.  The Republic’s population is 270 million.

The government reckoned it could collect about one thousand trillion rupiah (US$ 74 billion) from two million rich listers, but got run down by reality.  Less than 150 trillion rupiah was recovered from just one million citizens.

These measures, though fine in intent, don’t tackle the key issue that’s wounding the nation’s economy and international reputation.

Last year Phil Turtle, National President of the Australia-Indonesia Business Council, had the courage to be blunt.  He told the Australian Parliamentary Joint Standing Committee on Treaties:  

“When I'm talking to Australian businesses about contemplating Indonesia, it's a bit like the real estate saying —location, location, location — it's corruption, corruption, corruption.”

Indonesia ranks 89 in Transparency International’s corruption perception index.  Australia is in 13^th place.

Despite these flaws there’s no outward evidence of a looming financial crisis.   Widodo’s first five-year term (2014-2019) was marked by huge infrastructure projects largely funded by loans from China and Japan.

Toll roads, railways, ports and airports have been built at astonishing speed. A new US $31 billion capital in Kalimantan, the Indonesian province on Borneo Island, is being planned to replace polluted, overcrowded and sinking Jakarta.  Almost 70 people have died in city floods this wet season. 

Last year the nation owed US $383 billion in foreign debt, a rise of 7.2 percent on the previous year. Bank Indonesia appeared unworried, claiming the increase came from government borrowings.
This year the United Arab Emirates offered US $23 billion for more infrastructure and energy projects.  The money will go into a new sovereign wealth fund, also part of the proposed omnibus laws.

Inflation seems to be under control.  The government forecast three per cent last year but the figure was 2.72.  Sudden food and fuel price jumps have triggered mass protests in the past so keeping the economy stable is a political necessity.

While the Anglosphere has been obsessed with the trivial doings of the regal Brits, Indonesians have been gripped by tales of oligarchs steering luxury cars around taxation roadblocks.

They’ve allegedly been hiding their Mercedes and BMWs ownerships by registering them in the names of lowly employees.  Most couldn’t raise the down payment on a motor scooter yet on paper they’re proud owners of Ferraris.

Bemused foreigners might ask how these vehicles could get into the country without owners paying duty, and then escape detection when driven around Jakarta.  One who didn’t was Ari Askhara, president director of the government-owned airline Garuda Indonesia.

He was sacked after allegedly smuggling a disassembled Harley Davidson motorcycle and Brompton folding bicycles on a new Airbus A330-900 being delivered to the airline.  The manifest apparently listed the parts in the names of employees, but someone dobbed in the boss.  

Revenge or conscience?  If the latter then things are looking up.

First published in Pearls and Irritations, 27 January 2020:
https://johnmenadue.com/duncan-graham-this-bus-isnt-moving-fast/

PERCEPTION IS REALITY

If the watchman’s restrained, investors flee                                  

An Indonesian friend involved in a messy divorce was advised by colleagues not to hire a lawyer.  Instead he should bribe the judge more than his estranged wife was paying.

Being a moral person he refused, believing it’s every citizen’s duty to help purge corruption from the nation.  He paid an attorney and lost his case.

A local personal pain but one indicating a national ill making investors quake.  Surreptitiously sliding an envelope across a desk anywhere in the Archipelago is risky business for Australians – home and away.

Bribing a public official is a crime here in the Republic and over there in the Commonwealth; the dirty deal may have been done any place between Sabang and Merauke, but a prosecution can be launched anywhere between Perth and Sydney.

The penalties are harsh: Up to ten years in an Ozzie prison, or a fine of AUD 1.78 million – or both.  Drug runners get less.

President Joko Widodo frequently says he wants funds from foreigners to help boost the economy. So who to dial should a joint venture turn to custard through corruption?

Not the

 Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi (KPK - the Corruption Eradication Commission) if its authority gets weakened by lawmakers.  Even if the proposers deny changes will neuter the Commission’s powers, the view from afar is likely to be negative.
As the seers say, perception is reality.

Access to the rule of law delivered impartially is important to overseas entrepreneurs; if the scene’s not clean they just trouser (or handbag) their wallets and head to international departures.

Giving evidence to the Australian Parliamentary Joint Standing Committee on Treaties in Perth earlier this month Louise McGrath, national manager of the Australian Industry Group said:

“When companies aren't sure of the risk they simply don't invest. If we look at the numbers, I think New Zealand is the beneficiary of our greatest investment overseas because it's very low risk.

“We're not taking the high-risk and potentially high-rewards investments into places like Indonesia … (when) the environment seems risky, companies simply don't invest in that market.”

The committee is examining the Indonesia-Australia Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (IA-CEPA) signed in March though yet to be ratified by legislatures in both nations.

Other witnesses stressed that the Indonesian government will have to tackle corruption and the “regulatory chill” of excess red tape seriously if it wants to entice Australian dollars.

Last year the Badan Koordinasi Penanaman Modal (BPKM - Investment Coordinating Board) fell short of its investment target of Rp 765 trillion by nine per cent.

Phil Turtle, National President of the Australia Indonesia Business Council, told the committee:  “The elephant in the room is corruption.

“When I'm talking to Australian businesses about contemplating Indonesia, it's a bit like the real estate saying —location, location, location —it's corruption, corruption, corruption.”

Two years ago research by Transparency International Indonesia suggested corruption added about ten per cent to production costs. It also claimed that 17 per cent of businesses collapsed because competitors bribed officials.

TII’s Corruption Perception Index puts Indonesia in 79^th place, a marked improvement since 2014 when President Widodo was first elected.  In that year it ranked 107.  As teacher report cards say about bright laggards:  ‘Improving, but could do better if he tried harder.’

The TII added: ‘Corruption is present in all three branches of government in Indonesia and is one of the major constraints on the political leadership’s capacity to govern effectively.
‘Political corruption is particularly pervasive, and Parliament is widely considered the most corrupt institution. Similarly, bureaucratic corruption is rampant and a large part of the population reports paying bribes for services.’
It also noted the KPK’s ‘stellar performance’ and society’s ‘positive view of the government’s efforts to fight corruption.’  That was before law changes were proposed.

At present Indonesia doesn’t feature in the top 20 nations where Australian investors feel comfy about depositing cash and assets.

According to Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, while the US and the UK remain the most favored places for Australians to park dollars, pledges to Asia have increased dramatically over the past decade.

Recipients include China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Korea and Taiwan; investment in this cohort has more than tripled from AUD 108 billion to AUD 395 billion.

Though not Indonesia;   Southeast Asia’s largest economy gets only AUD 10.7 billion from its southern neighbor.  That’s less than half of one per cent of the AUD 2. 5 trillion posted abroad.
If the keen but concerned traders like Mr Turtle are correct, Indonesia needs a clean place to lure dollars from Down Under. That means maintaining a watchman ready and able to keep the environment corruption-free.

First published in The Jakarta Post 15 October 2019

##

CORRUPTION CRIPPLES SOCIETY

Frenky Simanjuntak

Inspired by Orwell                            

                           

What does a corruption-buster do when hassled for a backhander?

Pay up and get back to business because protests waste time and temper – or berate the official and call the cops?

Raising Cain isn’t smart when the gouger wears a uniform.

This was the dilemma faced by Transparency International’s Frenky Simanjuntak when being fingerprinted by the police for a clean slate certificate required for a foreign scholarship.

“To be honest I paid the Rp 10,000 (US $1),” he said.  “It wasn’t a legal charge but I reasoned the money would have gone into the staff fund.  Some argue this is disguised welfare for people on low wages – but it’s still wrong.

“Though the police have the highest bribery rate in Indonesia with up to 40 per cent corrupt according to TI research, I have a little sympathy for their dilemmas. In some cases they have cars but no fuel, so resort to shaking down motorcyclists for gas to maintain their patrols. Reform must be integrated.”

Big corruptors outrage the electorate and inflame headlines with their gross behavior.  But it’s the petty everyday graspers who are hardest to eradicate because they’re tolerated by the public as the price of doing business.

“Corruption thrived for the 30 odd years of Soeharto,” said the former manager of TI’s economic governance department in Indonesia, “but decentralization has made the problem worse.

“We are making progress in countering corruption, though it’s a slow process.  There’s a strong need for education about the damage caused to the country, but so far most effort has been put into prosecution.”

Indonesia ranks alongside Egypt at 118 according to TI’s corruption perception index, slipping down from 100 the previous year. New Zealand, Finland and Denmark are the least corrupt, all at number one.  The US ranks 13.

TI is a non-profit organization operating in more than 100 countries and promoting good governance.  It is funded by agencies, governments and individuals and publishes the donor list on the Internet.

Frenky, 38, quit his job in Jakarta this year after winning a NZ government scholarship to study public policy.  He listed transparency, ease of accessing information and good law enforcement as key factors in clean administration, along with social intolerance of dishonesty. 

Shortly after arriving in the South Pacific nation he saw media hounding of a government politician who had been rude to a hotel waiter.  Public distaste of the policy maker’s behavior forced the man to quit parliament.  Commented Frenky wryly: “That would not have happened in Indonesia.

“Our education system is a disgrace.  Schooling is not about understanding integrity but rote learning. We should be teaching honesty and accountability from the very beginning.

“At TI I worked with the private sector in anti-corruption projects.  Foreign bosses often asked: ‘How can we do anything here without paying bribes?’

“The answer is to join with other companies where all agree not to support corruption.  Overseas countries that have laws prohibiting their nationals from bribing public servants in Indonesia and elsewhere are effective.  They provide the initiative for business people to work together.”

Before joining TI Frenky worked as a researcher with another Non Government Organization, the now defunct Center for East Indonesian Affairs under sociologist Dr Ignas Kleden.

The center closed when overseas funding evaporated, though not before Frenky had spent six years on conflict resolution in Kalimantan between indigenous Dayaks and Madurese transmigrants, and in Ambon between Muslims and Christians.

He was involved in voter education projects leading to the 2004 election particularly in Papua, a province he first visited as an anthropology student on fieldwork from the University of Indonesia.

“The things I’d heard about Papua were very scary, but that wasn’t true,” he said.  “They are intelligent and funny people and I really enjoy their company.

“There has to be a peaceful resolution to the problems after pulling out the military.  But I don’t want to see West Papua secede.”  His wife Florencia Yuniferti also works as a university researcher in the province.

Frenky’s track into the dirty world of corruption started as a child when he read British writer George Orwell’s famous allegory Animal Farm in English, a language he’d been encouraged to study by his parents.

“For me politicians were like the pigs in the book,” he said.  “They talk glibly and make lots of promises.  There’s always the possibility of change, however dire the situation.”

The exception on his loathe list is former president Gus Dur - “a powerful Muslim leader with an open-minded approach.”

Frenky’s father, an executive with a fertiliser company, traveled widely overseas, returning with books and stories of a wider world to grow the imaginations of his four children.

The Christian Batak family moved from Palembang in South Sumatra to the capital when Frenky was a babe.  So he considers himself a Jakartan raised in an ethnically diverse district where, he said, he never experienced prejudice.

At university he demonstrated for democracy and became a political activist, though “not hard core, and never arrested”.   He started working for NGOs “because I felt a responsibility to be an agent of change – and wanted to work where it matters.”

Though shrinking from the idealist label he added: “I want to contribute something, to myself, the people around me – and the community.”

After two years studying public policy in NZ he’ll be looking for a position with the Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi (KPK – the Corruption Eradication Commission) – if it still exists after a new president is elected in 2014.

The job he wants is in public education, not bugging hotel rooms and retrieving fat envelopes from startled crooks in sting ops.

“The KPK does a good job, but prosecution and prevention should be separate,” he said. “We need to explain that corruption is stealing from our country, denying the government money necessary for public works.

“You cannot be a corruptor and morally pure.  That may not be the situation legally but it is so ethically.”

(First published in The Jakarta Post 10 June 2013}

##

THE FINE POLICE OF INDONESIA

In praise of Bali’s corrupt cops

It’s not often you read a story complimenting Bali’s sticky-fingered law enforcers, particularly after their exposure by Dutch entrapment artist Van Der Spek.

He’s the bareheaded bikie who You-Tubed a traffic policeman taking a bribe to waive the ticket. It’s an arresting video.

Anyway, here’s my cautionary tale. 

Some time ago in Kuta we needed rupiah. Then, as now, there was no shortage of moneychangers along Jl Legian offering juicy rates, far sweeter than those posted at banks and hotels.

Keen to ‘maximise returns on investments’ as bankers say (aka ‘greedy’) we chose the top offer in town.  What did it matter that the rate ended in an odd number and the bank was a dirty desk in an unlit corner of an overstocked clothing and artefact store?

Of course I knew of caveat emptor, but I was one big Westerner who’d studied maths at uni and was armed with a real calculator.  No little local with a doctored abacus was going to outsmart me.

The friendly shopkeeper apologised for his lack of large denomination notes, but, he chuckled, five, ten and 20 thousand rupiah notes were legal tender, even though well worn and confusing to outsiders. Of course. Ha, ha.

I laid down $500 in traveler’s cheques to one side of the counter.  A curious assistant sauntered across to watch his colleague and make small talk.  “Where was I from and how much did I pay for the camera?” Nice fellow.

The suckers enjoyed the chat and watched the piles of notes grow, get resorted, moved and double counted.  Handshakes all round.  Receipts?  Not necessary

Back in the hotel we were hit by reality and a Rp 600,000 shortfall.  The righteous receptionist said I should have used their service and ridiculed requests to call the police.

“They won’t come,” she said.  But they did in minutes, five young muscle men in casual clothes, pistols in belts, and a jeep.

They drove us back to the shop.  The moneychanger denied knowledge.  One cop walked round the counter and started ransacking the desk. Another barged his way into the back room. 

Their mates started manhandling stock.  Roughly. Very roughly. Soon fragile goods would tumble off shelves, clothes would rip, artwork shatter. Customers fled.  The staff blanched.

It seemed the confrontation would turn violent. Maybe getting our money back wasn’t such a good idea.  The scene was like a movie about the prohibition era with American cops raiding a sly grog shop.

If the police were trying to make an impression on a greenhorn foreigner then they were doing a splendid job.

Our cheques were found. One officer tapped the cheat’s chest and invited a refund.  Rp 200,000 was offered.  Clumsy cops started bumping into the furniture.  A further Rp 200,000 appeared.  Belts were hitched and sidearms adjusted.  The rest of the money jumped onto the desk.

Back in the jeep I congratulated the cops and told them that in my country the police would have just taken statements. They’d need search warrants.  Lawyers would get involved.  Should charges be laid the case would take months to reach court.

The chances of the artless dodger getting more than a warning and me my cash would be slight.  But here in Indonesia a fraud had been fixed in a flash and the criminal given one hell of a fright.  Instant justice – brilliant!

Happy to help, said the sergeant, all part of the service. Just one small issue – there’s another difference between Australian and Indonesian police; we locals are badly paid.

I rapidly reckoned Rp 100,000 split between five men was a fair price, and an appropriate penalty for my own stupidity.

Corruption?  Technically, yes. Effective?  Absolutely.  Qualms? A few and evaporating.

Back in Bali this year I tried a different shop to see if the scam was still alive.  Sorry, Pak, only small notes available. My friend just likes watching and chatting. You’re right, the light needs fixing. Cute camera, what did you pay? Now how much do you want? 

So nothing changes - and thanks to Van Der Spek we know the police are still accommodating.   

(First published in The Sunday Post 28 April 2013)

##

SUSTAINING INDONESIA

Sustaining Indonesia

Dr Suriptono isn’t a measurable, standard issue lecturer in civil engineering. He has to be viewed through a prism of ethics, not the theodolite of science.

Instead of asking his students at Malang’s Merdeka University to test the load-bearing qualities of lintels he sets three basic questions:

Who am I? Why am I here on earth? What am I going to do in the world?

“They answer anonymously and most reply: ‘I don’t know’,” he said. “As the course progresses some start to find answers. If you can’t make life meaningful then you can’t live a life of meaning.

“To make Indonesia a better place we must have a vision. Visions drive people to achieve.”

The students also ask a question: ‘Why are you different from other teachers?’

One reason is because Suriptono, who runs classes in sustainable development for third year students, dreams of bettering his homeland using his intellectual gifts and blessings of good fortune by inspiring others.

And whether they like it or not the students have to listen; his course is compulsory for all who study civil engineering.

On Western campuses engineering faculties include terms like ‘environment’ or ‘sustainable’ in their titles. They try to show they’re no longer crash-through constructors, but sensitive men (about 10 per cent of undergraduates are women) more interested in mind than muscle.

Merdeka’s Rector Professor Anwar Sanusi has asked Suriptono to investigate establishing a National Institute of Sustainable Engineering. The idea is to magnetize the best thinkers into moving to Malang, drawing into their field the smartest students.

As an advocate for the softer and caring side of engineering it would be hard to find a more appropriate ambassador than Suriptono. Now 61 he comes across as a young idealist rather than a calloused engineer bulldozing problems.

Yet Suriptono once spent 20 years among cement mixers and bricklayers before reconstructing his life as a mild-mannered and reflective academic.

As a contractor building houses he had to authorize the felling of trees and the draining of paddy. Under his direction sharp blades shaved the earth raw. His wallet was enriched but his soul was scarified.

Growing up in Bondowoso, a small town south-east of Surabaya during the 1950s (“a struggle period”) Suriptono wandered forests deaf to chainsaws, swam rivers yet to taste toxins. Not that he had much spare time. His father was a local administrator, his mother ran a snack business. As the eldest child of three he helped prepare foods and deliver orders.

Mum’s ambition was clear: Her children had to be well educated, and that cost. “Everyone has a big enemy you have to defeat,” she told her able son. “That enemy is laziness.” So he rose before dawn and only studied once his chores were complete. A whiz at mathematics the lad was sent to a Catholic high school in Malang where he sold T-shirts and snacks to supplement his allowances

Next stop was Satya Wacana, the Christian University at Salatiga in Central Java where he graduated in civil engineering and dreamed of working for IBM. Instead he went back to Malang to study at Merdeka.

But his academic career was cut short by his mother’s ill health. Her savings went on medical care, so Suriptono turned to contracting. When he wasn’t doing deals and supervising workers he thought deeply and read widely.

As a youngster he’d been touched by the Genesis creation story. As a student he encountered the writings of Ernst Schumacher: “Today we suffer from an almost universal idolatry of giantism, it is therefore necessary to insist on the virtues of smallness where this applies.”

Where better to apply the British economist’s Small is Beautiful thinking than Indonesia? “It’s very difficult to do things on a large scale here,” Suriptono said. “With centralized sewage systems 70 per cent of the cost is in capital equipment. Imagine the installation disruption in big cities.”

In the early 1990s Suriptono was selected for higher study at Perth’s Murdoch University under environmental scientist Professor Peter Newman, a man of like mind.

Four years later Suriptono was back in Indonesia with a PhD earned by studying community wastewater projects. Supported by his general practitioner wife Kityawati, he decided to recalibrate his life and become a change agent.

He took a hefty income drop and set about publishing, lecturing and teaching, seeking to influence the next generation to think more carefully and constructively, and so create a better world.

“I want to change the mindset of my students,” he said. “If we are just civil engineers all we do is damage the earth. We need to develop the wisdom to protect the environment and apply the three Rs – recycle, reuse and reduce.”

Now he advocates local sanitation solutions developed through gotong royong principles. Indonesia’s famous community self-help tradition is the great plus. But there are also cultural downsides

However good, imposed ideas tend to fail. So education has to precede projects, and as Suriptono knows from his early days in Bondowoso, rural folk take a while to change their ways.

Not all ideas migrate well. Dry compost toilets, now the trend in rural Australia, are unlikely to succeed in Indonesia where using water for ablutions is religiously fixed. Laws fail unless widely accepted and properly policed. In Malang it’s illegal to litter and burn trash, yet waterways are thick with plastic and smoke drifts down streets.

Inevitably there’ll be corruption. “We are contaminated,” said Suriptono in a rare flash of intolerance. “Yet most of us keep silent. Criticism of public officials can be culturally sensitive.”

Then there’s the personal economic factor, perhaps the most significant.

“People are poor and have no time to think of the environment if their stomachs aren’t full,” Suriptono said. “I thought my childhood was tough, but some of my students exist on only one meal a day.

“Sustainability is the art of maintenance, so we don’t draw on the needs of future generations to satisfy our needs today. Change must come from the young knowing that if we damage the environment, the environment damages us.”