PRESIDENT ASKS KPK TO ALSO HELP PREVENT CORRUPTION

Jakarta, Feb 12 (ANTARA) - President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has asked the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) to combine its graft-fighting activities with efforts to prevent corruption, the commission's chairman, Antasari Azhar, said here Thursday.
Speaking to the press after a meeting with the president to report the KPK's performance in 2008, Azhar said the president's vision, mission, and strategy on eliminating corruption were similar to the KPK's.
"The KPK shares the president's vision, mission, and strategy in that actions to fight corruption should go hand-in-hand with efforts to prevent it," Azhar said.
With regard to corruption eradication in the future, Azhar said, the president fully supported the continuation of KPK's mission.
"Onother thing the president conveyed was an appeal to the public to understand that in every effort to improve a situation in a country, in any country, excesses may occur. And that it was therefore the duty of all to minimize such excesses while continuing to pursue the goal of a better future," Azhar said.
Asked what was meant by "excesses," the KPK chief said the intensified drive against corruption in the country had undoubtedly disturbed the peace of mind of certain parties.
"I think what it meant was that when we started to get into the right spirit, synergy, and ideology to eradicate corruption, certain parties no doubt became worried or unhappy," he said.
Azhar said the KPK would in 2009 continue to do its best in performing its duties to save state-owned money.
"We are not in a position to build cases but we will at least concentrate on efforts to save state money," the KPK chairman said.
Meanwhile, presidential adviser on legal affairs, Denny Indrayana, said President Yudhoyono at the meeting with the KPK chairman asked the commission to do three things.
The first was to maintain close cooperation with the government at all levels, including the police. Secondly, to step up corruption-fighting operations, especially to dispose of outstanding corruption cases, and thirdly, to take more effective actions toward bureaucratic reform so that the people could enjoy quick and inexpensive public services. ***1***