Further revelations of wrongdoing within the justice system surfaced in January. In the latest instalment of the controversial case of Gayus Tambunan, it has transpired that the former tax official was issued with a false passport and allowed to travel to Singapore, the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, and the Chinese-ruled special administrative region of Macau in September 2010, when he was meant to be in police custody facing corruption charges. This followed the controversy that erupted after Mr Tambunan was photographed at a tennis tournament on the resort island of Bali in November when he was also supposedly in custody.
Despite the public interest in Mr Tambunan's case, there is little sign that the administration is stepping up its campaign against corruption. A high-level taskforce established by Mr Yudhoyono in late 2009 to combat corruption in the judiciary, the Judicial Mafia Taskforce, has all but disappeared, having received little public support from the president or senior members of the administration. In late 2010 a former law professor, Busjro Muqoddas, was appointed to lead the Anti-Corruption Commission (KPK), a challenging position for which he was widely perceived to lack the requisite toughness of character. The KPK's investigation budget for 2011 has also been cut to only Rp19.2bn (US$2.1m), down from Rp26.3bn in 2010, with similar cuts to budgets for handling corruption cases also recorded at the attorney-general's office, the Supreme Court and the National Police, according to an independent watchdog, the Indonesian Forum for Budget Transparency (FITRA). In late 2010 Mr Yudhoyono appointed a former deputy attorney-general, Basrief Arief, to the post of attorney-general, dashing hopes that he would install an outsider to eradicate the corrupt practices that prevail within the state prosecutor's office.
Taken together, these developments suggest that the fight against corruption is being wound down, with little intention of taking on the well-connected interest groups that profit from the status quo. For the time being foreign investors appear to be willing to acquiesce to Indonesia's corrupt ways, as they seek to tap into the country's promising economic growth prospects. However, the lack of political will to tackle corruption will surely damage Indonesia's appeal to investors in the longer term, damaging its prospects of achieving sustainable growth and development.