Sri Mulyani Reveals Strategy In The Action Of Illegal Goods Smuggling

Minister of Finance Sri Mulyani (Photo: dock. Antara)

JAKARTA - Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati revealed several strategies to prevent the entry of illegal goods smuggling into Indonesia. One of them is by strengthening synergies between Ministries/Institutions (K/L).

"We can see the mode used so we need to tidy up to emphasize that coordination is very important," he said at a press conference at the Customs Office, Thursday, November 14.

In addition, Sri Mulyani said that in preventing the Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Center (PPATK), it has an important role in detecting the flow of money from illegal transactions.

"For prevention, of course, we need to look at the modus operandi, the perpetrators, the type of goods, how the mode of work and how the flow of money will be. This will be more and more complete, what we call the pattern of various illegal actions. As well as illegal activities," he explained.

According to him, understanding these modes will facilitate understanding of the pattern of crime used and help strengthen supervision.

Sri Mulyani added that each ministry and institution has authority in accordance with the law and without good coordination, criminals can take advantage of this.

"K/L has the authority based on statutory regulations. If it is not coordinated, it will create opportunities because each of them can move within its own authority, but then the perpetrators can take advantage of various authorities," he said.

Therefore, Sri Mulyani hopes that the Coordinating Ministry for Political and Security Affairs (Menkopolkam) with the establishment of this special action desk can monitor data together.

"So we hope that Mr. Polhukam (Budi Gunawan) will make an action desk because we can now compare monitoring together. If there is a combination of repairs, it can be immediately detected by the Coordinating Minister and we can fix it," he said.

Previously, Sri Mulyani revealed that there were a total of 31,275 prosecutions that had been carried out with a value of Rp6.1 trillion and a potential state loss of Rp3.9 trillion. This figure comes from the prosecution and supervision of illegal trade activities from January to November 2024.

"Since the beginning of 2024, smuggling has been carried out in the field of customs and excise 31,275 times. So we imagine that every month we have done more than 5,000. The value of the goods is Rp. 6.1 trillion and the potential for state losses can reach Rp. 3.9 trillion," he said.