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Even before the fit-and-proper tests for antigraft candidates get under way today, some parties at the House of Representatives have already determined which candidates they will vote out.

Ahmad Yani, a United Development Party (PPP) legislator, said over the weekend that some of the parties in House Commission III, which oversees legal affairs and is responsible for selecting four new deputy chairmen for the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), had made it clear that they would not support the candidates from inside the antigraft body.

“Other parties have rejected them, I don’t know why,” he said.

“Maybe it’s because Abdullah [Hehamahua] has shown zero tolerance toward corruption. But not the PPP, we really want to see him selected.”

Abdullah is a senior adviser with the KPK and one of the eight candidates in the running.

Yani said other candidates the PPP would also be backing included human rights activist Bambang Widjojanto, former anti-money laundering chief Yunus Husein, lawyer Abraham Samad and National Police Commission member Adnan Pandupraja.

Trimedya Panjaitan, from the opposition Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), said his party would support Bambang Yunus, Abraham, police officer Aryanto Sutadi and prosecutor Zulkarnaen.

The eighth candidate is Handoyo Sudrajat, the deputy internal supervisor at the KPK.

Adnan Topan Husodo, deputy chairman of Indonesia Corruption Watch, said legislators should forget about the idea that there must be at least one policeman and one prosecutor among the deputies.

“Candidates from the prosecutors’ office and police should be selected based on competence and integrity, not a quota,” he said. Appointing police officers or prosecutors, he added, could lead to obvious conflicts of interest.

Both institutions, he said, were consistently listed among the country’s most corrupt, according to surveys from different antigraft groups.

Imam Prasodjo, a member of the selection committee that was set up to perform the initial screening of the candidates, said they had attempted to select the best candidates, regardless of where they came from.

But Trimedya said having police officers and prosecutors inside the KPK was essential.

“KPK leaders need to understand the technical aspects of an investigation all the way through to the prosecution,” he said.

He also blamed the late start of the fit-and-proper tests, which were postponed from last week because of technicalities, on political bickering.

“I sense that there are attempts [to prolong the selection process] because lobbying inside the different political factions is far from over,” he said.

The start of the tests were held up last Monday and Tuesday over squabbling about the use of outdated forms and questions about the absence of the chairman of the ad-hoc selection committee that oversaw the initial screening process.

After they stopped worrying over the administrative details, legislators from Commission III declined to start interviewing the candidates on Thursday, delaying it until today.

“Why weren’t [the interviews] done on Thursday evening? The majority of legislators on Commission III refused and asked that they be done on Monday,” Trimedya said. “I said it was best to do them quickly but was outvoted.”

The delays have raised concerns about whether the House can successfully name the four new KPK deputy chairmen before the current batch end their term on Dec. 17.