“Corruption is a major problem that is often felt by countries in the world, especially developing countries. Most of the existing literature on energy and corruption focuses on corruption cases in fossil fuels. However, there is some evidence to suggest that corruption risks also arise in the renewable energy market,” said Dr. Vishnu Juwono, S.E., MIA., permanent lecturer of Public Administration Study Program, Faculty of Administrative Sciences, Universitas Indonesia (FIA UI) in a public discussion of Civil 20 (C20) SummitSide Event “Recover Together, Recover Stronger: Energy Transition Without Corruption“, on Thursday (06/10).
He further said that in 2019, around 11% of global primary energy will come from renewable energy. Although the percentage of renewable energy is still relatively small, corruption is a big challenge for its increase. For this reason, it is necessary to take steps to reduce corruption cases, especially in the renewable energy sector. This was stated in his presentation entitled “Policy Recommendations for Anti-Corruption Policy in the Renewable Energy Sector: Regulation, Transparency, and Public Participation“.
“The form of corruption in the renewable energy sector is in public expenditure on renewable energy programs and subsidies. In addition, there is also tender fraud; bribery, inefficiency, and mismanagement; theft; inflating the cost of developing renewable energy infrastructure; and inefficient allocation of public contracts for renewable energy to those who are willing to bribe rather than those who are best able to provide the services needed,” said Dr. Vishnu.
In his presentation, he provided recommendations for anti-corruption policies in the renewable energy sector, including regulation, transparency and public participation. The regulation in question is the prohibition or blacklist of companies or institutions that are proven to violate the rules, especially related to collusion, corruption and nepotism in renewable energy projects.
In addition, he said, in the field of regulation, it is necessary to harmonize regulations in supporting anti-corruption policies, especially related to conflicts of interest in the renewable energy sector. Then it is also necessary to implement innovative renewable energy project evaluation tools from financial institutions and non-governmental institutions and have project organizers to conduct feasibility studies of renewable energy projects. Finally, involving audit institutions in renewable energy projects from upstream to downstream is also needed.
Then policy recommendations in the field of transparency consist of beneficial owner transparency and reporting on corporate political activities; creating a transparency platform of publicly accessible renewable energy project; and applying the rules of transparency of renewable energy projects in order to establish shared responsibilities in the project.
“In the field of public participation, it is necessary to provide access to information and massively disseminate information to the public about community participation from upstream to downstream related to renewable energy projects which are a shared responsibility and apply the rules for community participation in renewable energy projects,” said Dr. Vishnu, who is also the Head of Transformation Bureau, Risk Management and Evaluation Monitoring at UI Administrative Center (UI).
In this activity, Chair of the Anti-Corruption Working Group (ACWG) C20 Dadang Trisasongko was also present; Executive Director of Partnership Laode M. Syarif; Deputy Coordinator of Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW) Siti Juliantari Rachman; Founder & Executive Director of Accountability Lab Blair Glencorse; ACWG G20 Representative Budi Santoso; Board of Director Lokataru Foundation Nurkholis Hidayat; Head of Indonesian Publish What You Pay (PWYP) Division Mouna Wasef; Deputy Program for Transparency International Indonesia Wawan Suyatmiko; and a researcher of Transparency International Indonesia Ferdian Yazid as moderator.
