AGO urges reopening of Riau high-profile graft case
AGO urges reopening of Riau high-profile graft case
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Attorney General M.A. Rachman urged the Riau Prosecutor's Office
on Wednesday to reopen the investigation into a graft case
allegedly involving the province's former governor, Soeripto.
Rachman made the request to the new chief of the provincial
prosecutor's office, M. Huzaini, who he swore in to replace
Zainal Arifin Rifadin, Antara news agency reported.
"I hope the province's new chief prosecutor presents me with a
report on the case and reopens the investigation into it,"
Rachman said in the Riau capital of Pekanbaru.
The Pekanbaru District Court suspended earlier this year a Rp
24 billion graft case allegedly involving Soeripto due to a lack
of evidence, and asked prosecutors to amend the charges. Soeripto
had been accused of misusing state funds allocated for a seashore
reclamation project on Bintan island during his term as governor,
which ran from 1990 to 1998.
Rachman urged provincial prosecutors to do everything within
their power to get to the bottom of the alleged scam, as part of
the nationwide anticorruption drive.
"That is why I ask (Huzaini) to amend the charges so that we
can win the case in court without much trouble," Rachman said.
Soeripto is one of several governors and former governors who
have been implicated in corruption cases during the reform era,
which gained momentum with the fall of long-time president
Soeharto in May 1998.
Former Bali governor Ida Bagus Oka was the last person to find
himself included on this dubious list. However, Oka was cleared
of all graft charges last month.
West Java Governor R. Nuriana and Lampung Governor Oemarsono
have also been questioned over allegations of graft within their
administrations.
Rachman recently met in Jakarta with chief prosecutors from
across the country. From the meeting emerged a concerted effort
to eradicate corruption, collusion and nepotism, known by the
acronym KKN.
As a follow-up the meeting, North Sumatra chief prosecutor
Chairuman Harahap plans to deploy hundreds of junior prosecutors
to carry out investigations into 132 cases of corruption,
collusion and nepotism reported to his office by the public.
Chairuman said the junior prosecutors would begin work
immediately.
"We have summoned young prosecutors who we consider to be the
best from among their peers. They will go through a one-week
orientation program at the provincial prosecutor's office before
the mission starts," Chairuman said in the North Sumatra capital
of Medan on Wednesday.
He said he was committed to bringing all corrupters to
justice. "I pledged to eradicate KKN when I was appointed to the
top post in the provincial prosecutor's office. I will send the
corrupters to jail regardless of their rank."
His office, he added, has completed dossiers on 18 graft
suspects, including the treasurer of the Mandailing Natal Regency
administration, who is now on trial at the Padang Sidempuan
District Court for the alleged misuse of Rp 1.2 billion in state
funds.
Allegations of KKN highlighted last weekend's plenary session
of the South Kalimantan legislature, which heard factions'
responses to Governor Sjachriel Darham's accountability speech.
The legislature accepted the accountability report, but
factions from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, Golkar
and Justice Mandate parties spoke out about the US$20 million
excavation project on Barito river, which they said failed to
live up to the terms of the contract.
A special team has been formed to investigate alleged
irregularities in the project, which Sjachriel awarded to local
company Sarana Duta Prima Putra and the China Harbour Engineering
Company without an open tender.