Academy of Education Journal

Vol. 17, No. 2, June 2026, Page: 301-308

ISSN: 1907-2341 (Print), ISSN: 2685-4031 (Online)

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Ressy Mewengkang et.al (Public Engagement and Oversight for Accountable....)

Public Engagement and Oversight for Accountable

Governance in Corruption Prevention Efforts in

North Sulawesi Province

Ressy Mewengkang

a,1

, Brain Fransisco Supit

b,2

, Djoly Vekky Warokka

c,3

Universitas Negeri Manado, Minahasa 95618, Indonesia

ressymewengkang@unima.ac.id;

[email protected];

[email protected]

Article Information

ABSTRACT

Article History:

Received: 30 May 2026

Revised: 5 June 2026

Accepted: 24 June 2026

Avalaible online: 1 July 2026

This study aims to analyze the condition of accountable regional

governance in North Sulawesi Province, focusing specifically on the

dimension of engagement and oversight by all employees and the public,

one of the six key issues measured in the Integrity Assessment Survey. The

study employed a descriptive qualitative approach through semi-

structured interviews with three key informants representing different

levels of position, namely the Provincial Secretary, the Head of the Human

Resources Development Agency, and a staff member of the North Sulawesi

Provincial Social Affairs Office, supplemented by a review of secondary

data on Integrity Assessment Survey scores for the 2023 to 2025 period.

Data were analyzed thematically and interpreted through the lens of public

accountability and good governance. Based on the three-zone

categorization framework commonly used to interpret the Integrity

Assessment Survey index scale, the engagement and oversight dimension

score for North Sulawesi Province fell within the vulnerable-to-risk zone at

73.05 in 2023, remained in that zone with an increase to 76.10 in 2024, but

declined to the at-risk zone at 72.61 in 2025. The findings show that formal

complaint channels are available and reasonably actively used at the level

of regional secretariat leadership, yet their dissemination has not evenly

reached operational staff, while fear of retaliation and the absence of clear

whistleblower protection mechanisms tend to make participation among

lower-level employees passive. Public participation in overseeing public

services also remains limited due to the perception that government

responses to complaints are slow. This study recommends expanding the

dissemination of complaint channels to all levels of the civil apparatus,

strengthening whistleblower protection guarantees, and developing more

responsive public feedback mechanisms as strategic steps to strengthen

the accountability of regional governance in North Sulawesi Province.

Keywords:

Governance;

Public Accountability;

Engagement and Oversight;

Integrity Assesement Survey;

Corruption Prevention

This is an open access article under CC BY-SA license

1. Introduction

Corruption remains a fundamental challenge in the administration of local government in

Indonesia, not merely as a matter of legal violation but also as a reflection of weak

institutional governance that should serve as a safeguard for clean government administration

(Jawa et al., 2024; Kusuma, 2024; Supit, 2026). Local governments occupy a strategic position

in the corruption prevention agenda because they function as the primary providers of public

services and managers of public resources at the local level, so that the quality of their

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governance directly affects public trust in the state (Adeti & Christiani, 2022). One principle

underpinning accountable governance is openness of participatory space for employees and

the public to take part in overseeing the conduct of government administration, since

accountability without participation tends to stop at mere administrative compliance (Kusnaedi

et al., 2025; Mewengkang & Warokka, 2026).

As an instrument for mapping the integrity conditions of government institutions, the

Corruption Eradication Commission developed the Integrity Assessment Survey, which

measures six key issues, one of which is engagement and oversight by all employees and the

public. This dimension reflects the extent to which complaint channels, socialization efforts,

and participatory space for employees and citizens are available and function in practice to

support oversight of government administration (Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi, 2024).

Integrity Assessment Survey scores are commonly interpreted through three zone categories:

the red or at-risk zone for scores ranging from 0 to 72.9, the yellow or vulnerable-to-risk zone

for the range of 73 to 77.9, and the green or well-maintained zone for the range of 78 to 100

(Komisi Pemberantasan Korupsi, 2025).

Data on the engagement and oversight dimension for North Sulawesi Province between

2023 and 2025 reveal a pattern that warrants close attention when read through this

categorization framework. The score stood at 73.05 in 2023, positioned at the lower threshold

of the vulnerable-to-risk zone. It then rose to 76.10 in 2024, still within the vulnerable-to-risk

zone but approaching the threshold of the well-maintained zone. In 2025, however, the score

fell to 72.61, a decline that pushed this dimension's achievement out of the vulnerable-to-risk

zone and into the at-risk zone. This shift in category from vulnerable-to-risk to at-risk within a

relatively short period indicates that the progress achieved in 2024 had not yet been

institutionalized consistently, leaving that achievement susceptible to regression once its

supporting factors were not sustained.

Prior research on the integrity of regional governance in North Sulawesi has examined

organizational silence as a barrier to early corruption detection within the enforcement and

early-detection dimension, explaining how organizational culture makes employees reluctant

to voice suspected misconduct (Supit & Mantiri, 2026). That study made an important

contribution to understanding the enforcement dimension, but it did not specifically examine

how the engagement and oversight dimension, which involves complaint channels,

socialization, and participation of employees and the public, is experienced across different

levels of position, from leadership down to implementing staff. A systematic review of anti-

corruption policy in Indonesia likewise shows that the success of local-level anti-corruption

efforts is largely determined by a combination of institutional reform, capacity strengthening,

and community participation, yet literature that specifically traces cross-level experiences on

this participatory dimension remains limited within the context of provincial government

(Paranata, 2025). Other studies have focused more on the normative evaluation of anti-

corruption policy (Sutangsa, 2023) or on the institutional role of anti-corruption bodies in

general, without tracing the experiences of actors on the ground (Setiawan, 2025).

The novelty of this study lies in its examination of experiences across different levels of

position, from regional secretariat leadership down to implementing staff, specifically on the

engagement and oversight dimension, while also giving attention to the public participation

aspect that forms an inseparable part of this dimension. Building on this background, the study

is formulated to address the condition of complaint channels, socialization, and the

participation of employees and the public in overseeing government administration in North

Sulawesi Province, and how such conditions can be interpreted within the framework of

efforts to strengthen accountability and prevent corruption. This study aims to analyze these

conditions based on the actual experiences of civil servants in the field and to formulate

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Ressy Mewengkang et.al (Public Engagement and Oversight for Accountable....)

relevant policy implications, while also contributing academically to the development of

public administration studies on the participatory dimension of regional governance.

2. Method

This study employed a descriptive qualitative approach to gain an in-depth

understanding of how bureaucratic actors interpret and experience the practice of

engagement and oversight in government administration, rather than to test statistical

relationships among variables. The research was conducted at the Office of the Provincial

Secretariat of North Sulawesi, with field data collected in October 2025 through semi-

structured interviews. Informants were selected purposively to capture variation in

experience across levels of position: the Provincial Secretary, representing the leadership of

the regional secretariat; the Head of the Human Resources Development Agency,

representing the leadership of a technical regional agency; and a senior staff member of the

Social Affairs Office, representing implementing staff working directly in the field.

The interview instrument focused on the complaint channel and its effectiveness, the

reach of socialization efforts, fear of retaliation risk, and public participation in overseeing

public services. Primary data from the interviews were supplemented with secondary data in

the form of North Sulawesi's Integrity Assessment Survey scores for the 2023 to 2025

period, published by the Corruption Eradication Commission (Komisi Pemberantasan

Korupsi, 2024, 2025). Data were analyzed using thematic techniques, comprising

transcription, open coding, and the construction of an interpretive narrative that links field

findings with the framework of public accountability and good governance. The

trustworthiness of the data was strengthened through source triangulation, comparing the

accounts of the three informants across different levels of position and cross-checking them

against the quantitative data from the Integrity Assessment Survey.

3. Result and Discussion

Dynamics and Index Categories of the Integrity Assessment Survey on the Engagement

and Oversight Dimension

When read through the three-zone categorization framework, the performance of North

Sulawesi Province on the engagement and oversight dimension shows an unstable pattern over

the past three years. The score of 73.05 in 2023 placed the province at the lower threshold of

the vulnerable-to-risk zone, only slightly above the boundary with the at-risk zone. The rise to

76.10 in 2024 brought this achievement closer to the threshold of the well-maintained zone,

indicating an improvement in perceptions of stakeholder involvement and the effectiveness of

oversight mechanisms. That improvement, however, could not be sustained. The decline to

72.61 in 2025 pushed this dimension back into the at-risk zone, a category signifying an

increasing risk of irregularities in the engagement and oversight aspect. Such a comparatively

sharp change in score over a short period suggests that integrity performance on this

dimension remains heavily influenced by the dynamics of oversight implementation and by the

quality of relations among government, civil servants, and the public.

This pattern of rising and then falling below the initial-year achievement displays

characteristics different from the enforcement and early-detection dimension in the same

province, which shows a more consistently declining trend. This difference in pattern suggests

that issues within the engagement and oversight dimension are more fluctuating and sensitive

to changes in organizational conditions and in the environment of public service delivery. In

other words, changes in this dimension are likely driven by operational factors such as the

intensity of socialization, the effectiveness of internal communication, the level of

responsiveness to complaints, and the extent of public involvement in the oversight process.

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This indicates that an improved score in a given period does not necessarily reflect sustained

strengthening of the system unless it is supported by consistent institutional practice.

This fluctuation provides an important entry point for qualitative inquiry, since

quantitative data alone cannot explain why the 2024 improvement failed to continue, nor the

factors that caused the score to decline again into the at-risk zone the following year. The

index figure only describes the final condition, without revealing the process, experiences, or

constraints faced by actors within the organization. A deeper understanding therefore requires

exploring the experiences of civil servants across various levels of position, including how

they interpret oversight, participation, and reporting mechanisms. The following section

presents these qualitative findings to explain the mechanisms underlying the dynamics of score

change on the engagement and oversight dimension.

Availability of Complaint Channels and the Socialization Gap Across Levels of Position

The interview results show that channels for reporting suspected corruption and

gratification within the North Sulawesi Provincial Government are essentially already in place,

although they remain dominated by conventional mechanisms, with the digitalization process

only recently initiated. The Provincial Secretary explained that complaints can be submitted

through several channels, either directly to the Governor, through correspondence, or through

the Inspectorate, with the volume of complaints ranging from ten to twenty reports, dominated

by issues of regional budget management and complaints regarding leadership attitudes

perceived as lacking transparency. This account indicates that the formal reporting mechanism

is already used fairly actively at the level of regional secretariat leadership.

A different picture emerges at the level below. The Head of the Human Resources

Development Agency stated that a complaint mechanism does exist, but its socialization

remains limited to officials and has not evenly reached the entire civil apparatus, without being

accompanied by any formal employee or public satisfaction survey. At the implementing level,

the Social Affairs Office staff member recounted that knowledge of the complaint channel was

mostly obtained through information passed down by superiors rather than through formal

socialization, so that although access to lodge complaints is available, knowledge of the

mechanism and how to use it remains uneven.

These findings reveal a structural gap between the availability of formal channels at the

leadership level and the reach of socialization at the technical implementing level. This pattern

is consistent with the argument that accountability, transparency, and oversight fundamentally

reinforce one another in shaping public service performance free of irregularities, such that the

absence of any one element weakens the effectiveness of the others (Kushartiningsih &

Riharjo, 2021; Mewengkang & Warokka, 2026). A systematic review of anti-corruption policy

in Indonesia further confirms that external oversight mechanisms, including professional

audits, are generally more effective in curbing the misuse of public funds, whereas citizen-

participation-based oversight produces mixed results that depend heavily on the incentives and

protection mechanisms available to whistleblowers (Paranata, 2025). Without socialization

that reaches every layer of the organization, complaint channels risk being effectively used

only by officials who have direct access to leadership, while implementing-level employees

tend not to make optimal use of them even when they are aware of indications of wrongdoing

around them. This condition also aligns with findings on the effectiveness of whistleblowing

systems, which affirm that a complaint channel will only have a tangible impact on fraud

detection if it is accompanied by the active role of whistleblowers who feel safe and confident

that their reports will be followed up seriously (Wahyuningtiyas & Pramudyastuti, 2022). The

fluctuating pattern in North Sulawesi's engagement and oversight index can be interpreted as a

reflection of this condition: the rise in 2024 likely reflects the initial results of socialization

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directed at officials, while the decline in 2025 indicates that these efforts had not yet

succeeded in cultivating a reporting culture that extends broadly to implementing staff.

Fear of Retaliation and Public Participation in Overseeing Public Services

Fear of retaliation constitutes a significant barrier to building a participatory oversight

culture within public service settings. Beyond the issue of socialization, the Social Affairs

Office staff member admitted to never having been directly involved in reporting suspected

irregularities because the whistleblower protection mechanism was not clearly understood.

This occurred despite the employee's awareness of certain indications of wrongdoing,

including alleged additional charges for funeral services that should have been provided free

of charge. This reluctance to report shows that awareness of a violation does not automatically

translate into reporting action when employees still feel unsafe. Concern over possible

retaliation, whether in the form of social pressure, career obstacles, or unfair treatment in the

workplace, can lead employees to choose silence rather than take on a risk perceived as

detrimental to themselves.

This situation illustrates that the effectiveness of a whistleblowing mechanism is

determined not only by the existence of a reporting channel but also by the level of employee

trust in the protection provided by the organization. Employees will be more willing to come

forward with information when there are guarantees of identity confidentiality, clear

procedures for handling reports, and support from direct supervisors. Without such assurances,

reporting channels tend to remain merely formal and are not optimally utilized. As a result,

various indications of wrongdoing known to employees risk going undetected at an early

stage. Over the long term, this condition can reinforce a culture of silence within the

organization, rendering internal oversight less effective and leaving the door open for

irregularities in public service delivery.

On the other hand, the engagement and oversight dimension within the Integrity

Assessment Survey framework also positions the public as an external overseer of public

service administration. The Provincial Secretary acknowledged that the public tends to feel

insufficiently heard because the government's response to complaints is slow. This perception

can reduce public interest in using the available complaint channels, even though such

channels have formally been opened. When complaints are not followed up quickly and

transparently, public trust in the oversight system weakens as well. Strengthening

whistleblower protection, fostering an organizational culture that supports openness, and

ensuring a swift and accountable government response are therefore important factors for

enabling optimal participation by both employees and the public in supporting oversight of

public services.

Interpreting the Index Dynamics through the Lens of Public Accountability and Good

Governance

Taken together, the three findings discussed above, namely the socialization gap across

levels, fear of retaliation at the implementing level, and the perception of slow responses to

public complaints, converge on a single underlying issue: the uneven distribution of

information, protection guarantees, and responsiveness across the ranks of the bureaucracy as

well as between government and the public. These findings reinforce the argument within

good governance literature that the principles of accountability, transparency, and participation

cannot merely exist as formal policy but must be realized evenly across all layers of the

organization and in its relations with citizens if they are to genuinely function as effective

instruments of corruption prevention (Kusnaedi et al., 2025; Sedarmayanti & Aziz, 2020).

The fluctuation in North Sulawesi's engagement and oversight score, moving from the

vulnerable-to-risk zone toward the threshold of the well-maintained zone before eventually

falling into the at-risk zone, can thus be interpreted as an indicator that progress on this

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participatory dimension remains fragile and has not yet been institutionalized on a sustained

basis. Research on digital governance and political stability confirms that the effectiveness of

anti-corruption policy is strongly influenced by the extent to which oversight mechanisms

consistently reach every level of government, rather than only the highest tier of policymaking

(Zhao et al., 2025; Supit, 2026), an argument that is relevant to conditions in North Sulawesi,

where the availability of complaint channels at the leadership level has not been matched by

an equivalent reach at the implementing level or among the broader public.

This study complements earlier research on organizational silence as a barrier to early

corruption detection in several local governments in North Sulawesi (Supit & Mantiri, 2026)

by showing that issues within the engagement and oversight dimension have a distinct

character, resting more on the socialization gap and the absence of clear protection guarantees

than solely on an organizational culture that silences employee voice. Strengthening

accountable regional governance in North Sulawesi Province on this dimension therefore

requires three complementary steps: expanding the socialization of complaint channels to

reach all civil servants without exception, strengthening clear and reliable whistleblower

protection guarantees, and developing a more responsive feedback mechanism for public

complaints, consistent with the conclusion of the systematic review that the success of anti-

corruption policy at the local level depends on institutional reform, capacity strengthening, and

community participation moving forward together (Paranata, 2025).

4. Conclusion

This study shows that the engagement and oversight dimension of North Sulawesi

Province's Integrity Assessment Survey experienced significant dynamics during the 2023 to

2025 period, moving from the vulnerable-to-risk zone with a score of 73.05 in 2023, rising

while remaining in the vulnerable-to-risk zone with a score of 76.10 in 2024, before finally

falling into the at-risk zone with a score of 72.61 in 2025. This dynamic is consistent with the

qualitative findings that complaint channels are already available and actively used at the level

of regional secretariat leadership, but their socialization has not evenly reached implementing

staff, while fear of retaliation risk and unclear whistleblower protection mechanisms tend to

make participation among lower-level employees passive. Public participation in overseeing

public services also remains limited due to the perception that the government's response to

complaints is slow.

These findings affirm that strengthening accountable regional governance on the

engagement and oversight dimension requires an approach that consistently reaches every

level of the bureaucracy as well as its relations with the public. The Government of North

Sulawesi Province is advised to accelerate digitalization and expand the socialization of

complaint channels to reach the entire civil apparatus, strengthen whistleblower protection

guarantees formally and reliably, and develop a more responsive feedback mechanism for

public complaints. Future research is recommended to extend the scope of informants to

district and municipal governments within North Sulawesi Province, and to develop a

conceptual framework on employee and public participation that can be tested more

systematically in other regional government contexts in Indonesia.

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