President Prabowo Wants to Build a Special Prison for Corruptors, Will It Be Effective in Eradicating Corruption?

"I will also allocate funds later; I will build a prison that is very, absolutely very sturdy in a remote location, where they cannot go out at night," said President Prabowo Subianto during his speech at the inauguration event of the new mechanism for distributing civil servant allowances at the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education in Jakarta, Thursday (13/3/2025).

Furthermore, the President stated that he would look for an island to imprison corruptors. "We will find an island, if they want to escape, let them meet the sharks," he added.

His proposal regarding a prison island for corrupt officials serves as one of the affirmations of his commitment to the fight against corruption. He also stated that he is not afraid to confront corrupt individuals and is prepared to sacrifice his life for the nation and the people in the effort to combat corruption.

Referring to data from the Ministry of Immigration and Corrections, the number of inmates convicted of corruption cases as of January 2025 is 5,279 individuals. This figure is relatively small compared to those convicted in narcotics cases (dealers, distributors) totaling 91,739 individuals and narcotics users numbering 53,792 individuals. They are housed in correctional facilities and detention centers spread across the archipelago, with a total capacity of 146,053 individuals but currently accommodating 273,413 individuals.

Regardless of the extent to which the commitment is implemented, the idea of creating a prison island in a remote area is not a new concept. Previously, this discourse had also been proposed by Commissioner General Budi Waseso during his tenure as Head of the National Narcotics Agency (BNN) in December 2015. The difference is that the prison island would be designated for drug kingpins.

Not content with selecting a location far from the center of modern human civilization, which is often concentrated in metropolitan areas, Budi Waseso, commonly known as Buwas, also plans to surround the prison with a pond full of crocodiles.

In addition to crocodiles, pools of piranhas and wild tigers or other ferocious animals will also be placed around the prison. Buwas has even surveyed the location of the special prison for drug kingpins, which is around Madura Island.

The idea emerged because, during that period, the circulation of illegal drugs was always connected to correctional institutions. Not only connected, but the drug circulation was even controlled from behind the prison walls managed by the Directorate General of Corrections of the Ministry of Law and Human Rights.

In essence, at that time there were still problems in the prison, including inadequate conditions, the lack of integrity of officers, and an ineffective monitoring system.

It should be noted that in that year, the President of the Republic of Indonesia at that time, Joko Widodo, was echoing the war on drug abuse. On February 4, 2015, Jokowi declared Indonesia in a state of emergency for drug abuse.

Drug abuse has claimed the lives of up to 18,000 people a year. The peak of the fury over the never-ending circulation of illegal drugs was the execution of a death row convict who was also a big-time drug lord/drug dealer, Freddy Budiman, on July 29, 2016.

The question is, is the idea of creating a special prison island for corruptors in a remote area effective in eradicating corruption in this country?

Many parties doubt that this method can be a panacea to eliminate the disease of corruption that has become a cancer in the life of this nation.

Lecturer at the Faculty of Law, Muhammadiyah University of Surabaya, Satria Unggul Wicaksana, assessed that the President's idea was very far from the expectations of civil society and academics regarding a comprehensive strategy in eradicating corruption.

The most pressing agenda is actually the ratification of the Asset Confiscation Bill and how to maximize the role of campuses and civil society in providing input regarding the roadmap for eradicating corruption, including the national strategy and action plan for eradicating corruption.

"There is already a concrete roadmap, but the president, with his gimmicks, is building a prison on a remote island and many other gimmicks that are actually far from the essence or substance of the corruption eradication strategy," said Satrio.

According to him, if the head of state wants to eradicate corruption, the President should agree to the strategic action plan for eradicating corruption and of course immediately ratify the Asset Confiscation Bill.

In line with Satrio, a lecturer at the Faculty of Law, Mulawarman University, Herdiansyah Hamzah also agreed on the importance of the Asset Confiscation Bill being passed immediately. This is because the bill is one of the instruments to impoverish corruptors through asset confiscation. So far, this has not been possible because there is still regulatory control.

In addition, if corruption eradication is to be carried out effectively, Herdiansyah proposed that the President immediately return the Corruption Eradication Commission to an independent institution as it was before the revision of the KPK Law in 2019. So far, the revision of the KPK Law has been proven to weaken the institution.

"If you want to build a prison, wherever it is, even at the end of the world, it will not be effective (to eradicate corruption). Because, prison is the end of the corruption problem. What we have to solve is the upstream, not the downstream," said the man who is usually called Castro.

Furthermore, he was surprised by the President's idea to lock up corruptors on a prison island in a remote area. Because, the idea is counterproductive to the issue of efficiency which is currently the government's main target. "Where is the money going to come from to build a prison on the far side. This president is funny," said Castro who believes that even 1000 similar prisons will not necessarily deter corruptors.

Director of the Center for Human Rights Studies at the Islamic University of Indonesia (Pusham UII) Eko Riyadi assessed that the idea of creating a special prison for corruptors on a remote island was inadequate because it was based on a reactive and populist response. The idea was not based on scientific assessment and argumentation.

"Imprisoning corruptors must be accompanied by improving the government system. No matter how far and how remote the prison for corruptors is, it will not have any impact if the government system remains bad. Therefore, improving the government system is much more important for eradicating corruption than narrating populist and reactive ideas," said Eko Riyadi.

He is also concerned about the issue of prisoner supervision if the prison is in a remote area and far from public supervision. Because, prisons or correctional institutions in the middle of the city with quite large public supervision are not free from abuse of power and corrupt acts.

Moreover, the universal practice of differentiating prisons does not depend on the type of crime committed by the inmates. According to him, the approach to differentiating prisons depends on the level of risk (high, medium, light) and the category of inmates (children, women, adult men).

In contrast to the lecturer of criminal law at the Faculty of Law, Trisakti University, Abdul Fickar Hadjar. Although it does not or may not necessarily solve the problem of corruption, the experience of Nusakambangan Island as a prison feared by criminals can be a good example.

"I think the idea of a prison on a remote island as an effort to eradicate corruption should be appreciated. If Nusakambangan is for western Indonesia, making another one in the center and in the east would be an interesting effort to eradicate corruption," he added.

For a country with state spending in the 2025 State Budget of Rp3,621.3 trillion, building a prison island at the edge of the republic's territory is not impossible. In addition to the issue of the effectiveness of the prison island for detaining corruptors, the issue that needs to be considered is how to prepare officers who will guard prisons in remote areas. Are the officers who will manage the special prison the same as the employees of the Directorate General of Corrections who have been guarding and managing prisons and detention centers throughout Indonesia?

So, how is the possibility of finding human resources willing to be placed in remote areas? Fickar said, there is no need to worry. Indonesia has a surplus of manpower (human resources) so that the status as a state civil servant (ASN) is still an attraction in itself. Moreover, the state already has a formulation in providing welfare such as the existence of high-cost allowances for ASN who work in eastern Indonesia.

"What's important is skills training," said Fickar.

Director of the Center for Detention Studies (CDS) Gatot Goei said, to build a prison on a remote island, the government needs to consider security factors. For example, whether the island is close to police installations, fire stations, and hospitals. Because, these aspects are very important to support prison operations on an island and anticipate potential resistance by prisoners.

"At least it should be close to islands that already have infrastructure, adjacent to the remote islands. So, if for example there is an emergency, it can be deployed to help the situation in the prison," said Gatot.

Why do hospitals, police, and fire departments need to be close to prison locations or even installed as part of prison facilities? Because, added the man who has been in and out of prisons and detention centers to conduct research, what is being guarded is people. "So, if someone is sick, they still have to be treated. Because if they are not treated, that is torture, right?" he added, giving the example of the Class IIIa Hospital on Nusakambangan Island.

The second important problem to note is supervision. Because, according to Gatot, the further the location of the prison, the less supervision is carried out. The convicts can still "hang out" using the facilities they have, such as helicopters for example, and such incidents are not unheard of.

Another thing that is no less important is electricity. There needs to be a constant and stable electricity supply, as well as the internet. This is important if the prison is built using a super maximum security model like Karanganyar Prison, Nusakambangan Island, which already uses sophisticated technology. The doors at Karanganyar Prison can already be controlled from the security post, as well as the fences that already use electric shock fences and full CCTV in all rooms/cells.

With the Karanganyar Penitentiary model with super maximum security, the need to build a special prison for corruptors could reach four times the cost of building a regular prison. This means, according to Gatot, a relatively large budget is needed.

Apart from that, the construction of special prisons for certain prisoners, both corruptors and drug lords, has been a recurring discourse that has been raised since a decade ago. However, until now there has been no realization.

Prison islands in Indonesia, since 1908 when the Dutch East Indies government established a prison in Nusakambangan, until now there is still only one, namely Nusakambangan Island, an island covering 121 square kilometers in the south of Java Island, precisely in the Cilacap Regency area, Central Java.