Memorandum Rahasia dalam UU KIP

UU KIP Pasal 17:

i. memorandum atau suratsurat antar Badan Publik atau intra Badan Publik, yang menurut sifatnya dirahasiakan kecuali atas putusan Komisi Informasi atau pengadilan;

Penjelasan:

"Memorandum yang dirahasiakan" adalah memorandum atau surat surat antar Badan Publik atau intra Badan Publik yang menurut sifatnya tidak disediakan untuk pihak selain Badan Publik yang sedang melakukan hubungan dengan Badan Publik dimaksud dan apabila dibuka dapat secara serius merugikan proses penyusunan kebijakan, yakni dapat:

1. mengurangi kebebasan, keberanian, dan kejujuran dalam pengajuan usul, komunikasi, atau pertukaran gagasan sehubungan dengan proses pengambilan keputusan;
2. menghambat kesuksesan kebijakan karena adanya pengungkapan secara prematur; 
3. mengganggu keberhasilan dalam suatu proses negosiasi yang akan atau sedang dilakukan.

Saya ada 2 pertanyaan:

(i) Apa maksud "...kecuali atas putusan Komisi Informasi atau pengadilan" dalam penggalan kalimat terakhir Pasal 17 i? Apabila semua pengecualian dalam Pasal 17 pada akhirnya harus tunduk pada uji konsekuensi dan uji kepentingan publik, mengapa hanya Pasal 17 i yang mendapat kata kata "...kecuali atas putusan...."?

(ii) Apakah ada semacam guideline untuk pengecualian ini? Sejauh manakah batasan "Frank and Candour" (kebebasan keberanian dan kejujuran) dalam penjelasan pasal 17 i 1? Beberapa yurisdiksi lain memberikan batasan "Frank and Candour" kepada level pemerintahan yang tinggi saja.  Sankey v Whitlam [1978] HCA 43; (1978) 142 CLR 1 (9 November 1978)  (High Court of Australia) adalah yurisprudensi utama dalam permasalahan ini:


39. One reason that is traditionally given for the protection of documents of this class it that proper decisions can be made at high levels of government only if there is complete freedom and candour in stating facts, tendering advice and exchanging views and opinions, and the possibility that documents might ultimately be published might affect the frankness and candour of those preparing them. Some judges now regard this reason as unconvincing, but I do not think it altogether unreal to suppose that in some matters at least communications between Ministers and servants of the Crown may be more frank and candid if those concerned believe that they are protected from disclosure. For instance, not all Crown servants can be expected to be made of such stern stuff that they would not be to some extent inhibited in furnishing a report on the suitability of one of their fellows for appointment to high office, if the report was likely to be read by the officer concerned. However this consideration does not justify the grant of a complete immunity from disclosure to documents of this kind. Another reason was suggested by Lord Reid in Conway v. Rimmer (1968) AC, at p 952 :

"To my mind the most important reason is that such disclosure would create or fan ill-formed or captious public or political criticism. The business of government is difficult enough as it is, and no government could contemplate with equanimity the inner workings of the government machine being exposed to the gaze of those ready to criticise without adequate knowledge of the background and perhaps with some axe to grind."

Of course, the object of the protection is to ensure the proper working of government, and not to protect Ministers and other servants of the Crown from criticism, however intemperate and unfairly based. Nevertheless, it is inherent in the nature of things that government at a high level cannot function without some degree of secrecy. No Minister, or senior public servant, could effectively discharge the responsibilities of his office if every document prepared to enable policies to be formulated was liable to be made public. The public interest therefore requires that some protection be afforded by the law to documents of that kind. It does not follow that all such documents should be absolutely protected from disclosure, irrespective of the subject matter with which they deal. (at p40)

The quit facebook campaign

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We use Internet Explorer to install Chrome. We use facebook to lure its users to Google Plus.

No, I dont have any shares in google.

“Read-Only” Politics, Dana Kampanye dan Audit Pemilu

 

Presentasi Lessig di postingan saya sebelumnya mengkritik praktek lobi dana kampanye di Amerika yang membuat politik menjadi – istilah Lessig – “read only”, tanpa partisipasi yang berarti.

Lessig punya solusi: dana kampanye harus didanai oleh publik, tidak lagi lewat korporasi korporasi dengan lobinya. Ide yang bagus sekali, karena dengan publik mendanai kampanye, “principal” dari politisi bukan lagi korporasi, melainkan publik.

Dana kampanye di Indonesia juga mendapat subsidi negara, dan ada pembatasan pemberian dana sumbangan. Tapi tetap banyak sumbangan-sumbangan tidak bisa di kontrol dan biaya politik secara keseluruhan sangat tinggi.

Saya kutip dari pidato Sri Mulyani:

Dan proses ini ternyata juga tidak murah dan mudah. Sudah banyak orang yang mengatakan untuk menjadi seorang jabatan eksekutif dari level kabupaten, kota, propinsi, membutuhkan biaya yang luar biasa, apalagi presiden pastinya. Dan biayanya sungguh sangat tidak bisa dibayangkan untuk suatu beban seseorang. Saya menteri keuangan saya biasa mengurusi ratusan triliun bahkan ribuan, tapi saya tidak kaget dengan angka. Tapi saya akan kaget kalau itu menjadi beban personal.

Seseorang akan menjadi kandidat mengeluarkan biaya sebesar itu. Kalkulasi mengenai return of investment saja tidak masuk. Bagaimana anda mengatakan dan waktu saya mengatakan sya lihat struktur gaji pejabat negara sungguh sangat tidak rasional. Dan kita pura-pura tidak boleh menaikkan karena kalau menaikkan kita dianggap mau mensejahterakan diri sebelum mensejahterakan rakyat. Sehingga muncullah anomali yang sangat tidak bisa dijelaskan oleh logika akal sehat, bahkan Rocky bilangnya ada akal miring. Saya mencoba sebagai pejabat negara untuk mengembalikan akal sehat dengan mengatakan strukturnya harus dibenahi lagi. Namun toh tetap tidak bisa menjelaskan suatu proses politik yang begitu sangat mahalnya.

Bagaimana cara mengatasinya? Mari sedikit brainstorming:

Pertama harus ada pembatasan dana kampanye dalam undang undang.

Kedua harus ada pembatasan dari segi suplai dan demand dana kampanye. Demand dana kampanye besar tentu berasal dari publik dan tidak mudah mengontrolnya. Perlu semacam Voter’s Education yang mengubah preferensi publik terhadap kandidat atau partai dari obyek material menjadi ideal/konseptual. Tapi melihat politik Indonesia yang primordial seperti ini, tentu tidak mudah.

Ketiga harus ada audit kampanye dengan insentif kepada auditor untuk memburu “over budgetting”. Setiap kampanye harus memiliki pembukuan dan pembukuan tersebut harus dilaporkan. Audit kampanye harus bisa melacak dana kampanye yang “off budget”.

Republic Lost, a must watch presentation by Lawrence Lessig about corruption and democracy in the USA

Lessig is an expert in Intellectual Property Rights and founder of Creative Commons. He now changed his research subject into corruption.

Add your dropbox quota size using .ac (academic) email

This might have been a flaw, but it certainly works on me. I have collected so many referrals in dropbox to the max, so I am no longer able to add more of the free quota. But there’s this .edu program that will give you extra 500 MB for every referral to dropbox, and the program is retroactive, which means all my past referrals will be accounted for.

But I don’t have any .edu email address and its hard to get one unless you are studying in the US. So out of curiosity – and not expecting anything – tried to put in my UK university email address in the form at this page. Here’s the screenshot, but there is no more box because I have already used it.

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So, I opened my email and…. it WORKS!!!

Have a look at this:

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You can see clearly on the above that the email subject says: Verify your.edu email but below it, you can see information that it is being sent to my @dundee.ac.uk email address, which is the address that I put on dropbox form above.

So now, I have a FREE, 19.03 Gigabyte of dropbox quota. Yes. Envy-me-not, people.

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Now, I don’t know if this is a flaw or an unwritten policy. But if it is a flaw, I really hope that after this publication dropbox will retain my free quota, after all, I have (by accident) pointed out the flaw to them. If, however, this is an unwritten policy, then all academia can now enjoy it!!!


Update (14/12/2011 18:59):

My friend told me that this is neither an unwritten policy nor a flaw. Dropbox has been enabling it for some .ac domain since a year ago. See this link at Dropbox forum. Certainly this is not clear from their advertisement. Well then, enjoy folks!!!

Have you tried Schemer??

Guess not, coz its in the private beta, but I’ve got an invite thanks to Lifehacker.
I guess I am one of the first in Jakarta:

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And probably the first in Phnom Penh:

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Try Schemer.

Water Whiter Paper (UK Defra)

A very important announcement. UK's regulatory framework is about to undergo a major change. More importantly, Ofwat is moving towards a risk-based scheme in order to remove "unnecessary regulatory burden". 

For related reports, see:






Water for Life

 

We are pleased to let you know that Water for Life, the Government's Water White Paper, has been published this morning.  We wanted to take this opportunity to thank you all for the input you have provided to date, it has been very much appreciated.

 

Water for Life can be accessed via the following link: http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/quality/water/legislation/whitepaper/

 

Please let us know if we can provide any further information.

 

Water White Paper Team

Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra)

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