AGO still expects to probe alleged Bawazier fraud

JAKARTA (JP): The Attorney General's Office is still conducting a preliminary examination into several cases of alleged embezzlement of tax revenues that could involve former minister of finance Fuad Bawazier.

The office's spokesman Muljohardjo said on Tuesday that a special team headed by prosecutor Katimun was recently formed to handle the cases. But he said they could not probe the cases thoroughly as they had not received the dossiers from the Directorate General of Tax.

"By law, this office could only investigate tax embezzlement cases after the directorate general hands over the dossiers ... we have yet to receive them," he told journalists at his office.

The tax embezzlement cases surfaced following a meeting between the Attorney General's Office and the Directorate General of Tax recently.

Many speculated that former director general of tax Fuad Bawazier, who was also a former minister of finance, was involved in the embezzlement, since he had been questioned as a witness by the prosecutors in connection with irregularities which had occurred at his office when he was still in power.

Rumors had circulated that President Abdurrahman Wahid had ordered Attorney General Marzuki Darusman to arrest Fuad, now a member of People's Consultative Assembly, and businessman Arifin Panigoro, chairman of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan).

The two politicians are considered among Abdurrahman's most outspoken critics.

Marzuki denied the rumors.

Muljohardjo also said on Tuesday that prosecutors had yet to name magnate Prajogo Pangestu as a suspect for corrupt practices in his timber company PT Musi Hutan Persada.

"We are still studying the case. As soon as the prosecutors have uncovered his involvement in the case he would be immediately named a suspect," he told journalists.

Information on the alleged irregularities of PT Musi, located in South Sumatra, was submitted by former secretary-general of the forestry ministry, Suripto.

Suripto claimed that PT Musi had marked up the size of its timber plantation estate from its actual area of 118,000 hectares to 193,500 hectares in order to obtain a state loan from the reforestation funds, causing some Rp 331 billion in losses to the state.

Suripto also charged PT Musi of having manipulated its assets and industry concessions to obtain Rp 9.91 trillion from a consortium of 25 international banks and of manipulating data to reduce the actual forest area the company's had burned during reforestation.

Prajogo shares PT Musi ownership with Soeharto's eldest daughter Siti Hardijanti "Tutut" Rukmana who holds 14 percent in shares.(bby)