Aceh court slammed for freeing charged council members
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The Banda Aceh District Court ordered the release of 10 councillors being detained on graft charges, prosecutors and their lawyers said on Monday, while hundreds of protesters staged protests in several regions to demand legal action against corrupt lawmakers.
The court, however, ordered prosecutors to put the 10 local councillors under city arrest for their alleged role in embezzling Rp 5.6 billion (US$622,222) from the city budget.
Judges, who issued the order on Aug. 28, 2004, argued that the councillors had tasks to attend to, such as attending a crucial plenary meeting.
The court order drew ire from prosecutors and local people, who questioned the judges' commitment to bringing the charged councillors to justice.
Banda Aceh Prosecutor's Office head Pribadi Soewandi said on Monday he would file a complaint with the district court against the councillors' release.
Coordinator of local non-governmental organization (NGO) Aceh Court Monitoring Foundation Rufriadi deplored the decision, saying that the councillors could attend the plenary meeting without having their status changed.
The 10 defendants had been detained since Feb. 9.
In the Central Java city of Surakarta, police questioned five members of the local legislative council on Monday, including its speaker and his deputy, for their alleged involvement in a Rp 4.5 billion graft case.
The police embarked on the probe after a complaint was filed by several NGOs grouped in the Forum for Surakarta City Budget Concern.
The NGOs said that the councillors blatantly violated Government Regulation No. 110/2000, which stipulates that the budget allocated for the council must not exceed the benchmark of 10 percent of the city revenue.
"The city revenue averages between Rp 53 billion and Rp 55 billion, therefore the funds allotted for the council's operation should stand at around Rp 5.3 billion per year," said Alif Basuki, who spoke on behalf of the NGOs.
He alleged that the council members had embezzled around Rp 4.5 billion from the city coffers.
One of the charged council members, Bambang Mudiarto, denied the corruption allegations, saying the government regulation had been annulled by the Supreme Court through a judicial review. He did not elaborate.
In Bandung, West Java, some 500 students and workers demonstrated during the swearing-in ceremony of new 100 council members.
The protesters demanded that councillors from the earlier term be brought to court for misusing Rp 25 billion from the 2002 city budget, with the alleged complicity of West Java Governor Danny Setiawan.
They demanded that prosecutors be proactive in pursuing legal action against local councillors after three of them were named suspects.
Meanwhile in Samarinda, of the 45 new East Kalimantan council members, only 11 agreed to sign a pact stating that they would not be involved in corruption during their tenure.
The 11 councillors agreed to the move only after a tense argument with protesters on Monday, which marred the swearing-in ceremony of the new 45 council members for the 2004-2005 period.
In Batam, dozens of protesters staged a similar protest, demanding that local councillors from the 1999-2004 term be brought to court on corruption charges.
They insisted that the local elections commission postpone the councillors' inauguration, pending the result of a probe into corruption allegations.