Bali Police Chief Made Pastika – your slip’s showing!

Bali Police Chief Made Pastika – your slip’s showing!
By Bali BS News
Sep 20, 2005, 09:17

On the 2nd September 2005, The Australian newspaper published a report about attempted Bali police bribery fraud, an interesting paradoxical term in itself. It seems that an Indonesian gentleman called the Australian Consulate claiming to be or represent Bali’s police chief, Made Pastika, demanding $15,800 to have the drug charges against Australian model Michelle Leslie dropped. He actually demanded US$9,480 to arrange a meeting with General I Made Mangku Pastika and cited an additional $15,800 fee to then have Michelle Leslie released; Michelle is facing up to 15 years imprisonment in one of Indonesia’s charming jails for allegedly being caught with 2 ecstasy tablets and proving positive for amphetamines in her blood and urine samples.

Police Chief General Made Pastika denied this bribe seeking gentleman was anything to do with him, or did he? You see, this or a similar gentleman claiming to offer bribery opportunity meetings with Made Pastika himself has been at it with other foreign victims it seems. Regarding this Bali’s police chief actually said “They are making conversation about the promise to meet and transfer money, that’s it, in return for approaching me.” He hardly, therefore, denied the specter that a meeting with him could be bought for US$9,480. In fact, when you read what he said again it seems clear he was both trying to excuse the act and indicate that he would perhaps attend a meeting for some worthwhile cash!

However, police chief Made Pastika also said, specifically regarding Michelle Leslie, “I would like to tell anybody that bribery is not the good thing to settle this case. It won’t work.” The Freudian aspect and issue for Bali’s police chief with this is that he did not say what you would expect any police chief to about the possibility of bribery in a predominantly extortion free police force or even worse, the specter of bribing him personally. That is, he did not say that bribery will not work with the Balinese police or him period, as you would otherwise expect with an honest cop working for a decent police force. Pastika was very selective in his wording and it seems to confirm that he not only accepts that bribes can and do make police investigations go away, but it also indicates he would ordinarily take and probably has personally taken bribes himself as Bali’s police chief.

This de facto admission seems to be further confirmed by General Made Pastika when he also said “This is all outsiders wanting to fish in the black water”. We can not see how such an expression can be interpreted as anything other than a negative statement about the widespread corruption in Bali’s police force. Anyway, isn’t it a shame that the Australian Consulate did not have the sense or political bravery to accept the US$9,480 “meet Pastika to bribe him further” fee on the basis he personally gave the money to Bali’s police chief at the meeting! Of course Made Pastika now says “bribery is not a good thing to settle this case”, but is that solely because the story of Michelle Leslie is now very much in the public’s or rather the International media’s domain? When cases become so public, the police then become unable to extort money / accept bribes from victims?

Things get even more suspicious regarding the possibility that Made Pastika may well have been ready to take a back-hander to let Michelle Leslie go in that he claims he is going to set a trap for this alleged conman but then says he has a taped phone conversation of him and someone else. As Pastika stated he had a tape of this man in the context of the bribery / extortion attempts, you have to wonder what else he actually needs bearing in mind the now public disclosure of events and the trap are hardly likely to make this supposed conman forthcoming in further deeds. It seems Made Pastika is on the one hand saying they have evidence already against this man which most police would surely act upon, while stating they want more evidence yet make their intended operations known. It seems Made Pastika does not want this man to be caught, n'est pas?

The fact that the police and other government officials in Bali are so corrupt seems not only to be confirmed by Made Pastika’s own words, but by reports seen recently on travel forums of Indonesian gentleman approaching foreign tourists in Sanur saying they are immigration officers and asking the tourists to go with them, whereupon the visitors are fleeced of cash. It seems these are in fact fraudsters, not genuine government officers, although who knows for sure? But the point is the subject they choose to actually defraud people. In western societies conmen use lottery scams, tied up bank funds, etc. schemes. In Bali they use bent police and immigration officer schemes! Why? Because the schemes have to be believable, and the disgrace of that is the universal and widely held understanding that Bali’s police, etc. routinely commit extortion.

We believe Made Pastika’s comments show he is corrupt personally or at best that he tolerates corruption by his subordinates, and allows Bali to suffer such abject crimes by government workers. We believe it is the former, as condoning the later without further complicity does not make sense. As such we believe Bali’s police chief should be personally investigated for corruption immediately. That should include his financial records and assets being independently evaluated to determine if what he owns is compatible with what the government paid him in salaries. We also believe because, at the very least, he has apparently acknowledged his subordinate police officers are corrupt, he should be suspended immediately pending the investigation outcome. And finally we believe if Made Pastika has any decency whatsoever, as he projects in Time Asia Magazine by way of pious pictures of him praying, he should resign out of shame anyway for, at the very least, allowing Bali to become and / or remain such a corrupt and nasty island.