When FPI Called Timur Pradopo A Smart Man

Usman Hamid, who heads the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras), said such elites needed a police chief like Pradopo to protect their interests.

“The choice of police chief is a threat to those involved in corruption. Timur Pradopo won’t make things difficult for them,” he said.

Setara Institute for Democracy and Peace deputy chairman Bonar Tigor Naipospos said the moustachioed general would be “easily influenced”. “He has no outstanding achievements... He bends whichever way the wind blows,” he said. If that proves to be the case activists said it will be a seamless transition from outgoing police chief Bambang Hendarso Danuri, whose term was marked by numerous scandals.

Most recently, he was criticised over the alleged involvement of senior police officers in suspected judicial corruption surrounding the acquittal of an unusually wealthy junior tax official. Despite his chequered record, Yudhoyono stood by Danuri and allowed him to serve out his full term in office.

In addition to concerns about corruption, rights activists accuse Pradopo of complicity in the police shooting of four student protesters during the May, 1998 demonstrations that brought down Suharto. Reformists also fret that the police is too close to hardline Islamists, especially vigilante groups like the stick-wielding Islamic Defenders Front (FPI).

Pradopo was reportedly a founding member of the FPI in 1998 and attended its anniversary celebrations earlier this year. FPI militants do not advocate terrorism but share the jihadists’ agenda of bringing Indonesia under sharia law. Some members have been arrested in connection with terror plots but the group says they were acting on their own.

The FPI has warmly welcomed Pradopo’s nomination. Jakarta branch leader Habib Salim Al Attas called him a “very nice, firm and smart man”.