Akbar appeal: All good things come to those who wait?

Akbar appeal: All good things come to those who wait?

Muninggar Sri Saraswati, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

With the future political career of House of Representatives
Speaker Akbar Tandjung hanging in the balance, a Supreme Court
judicial panel is due to announce on Thursday its decision on his
appeal against conviction on corruption charges.

Justice Paulus Effendy Lotulung, who chairs the panel,
confirmed on Wednesday that the five-member panel would reconvene
on Thursday to further discuss the high-profile graft case.

"We will meet, but it does not mean we will complete our
deliberations and announce our decision to the public tomorrow as
we may not have enough time to arrive at a conclusion," Paulus
told reporters.

The other members of the panel are Parman Suparman, Arbijoto,
Muchsin and Abdul Rahman Saleh.

"I'm not going to say a word about the case. I believe that
silence is golden. People will find out what our decision is
after we announce it," Paulus said.

Pressure was mounting on Wednesday for the justices to finally
bring the Akbar case to closure, after what seems to have been an
extraordinary delay in a case of such major public importance.

Akbar was originally convicted by the Central Jakarta District
Court of involvement in a Rp 40 billion corruption scandal and
was sentenced to four years in jail. This was later reduced to
three years by the Jakarta High Court. Akbar has remained at
liberty since his conviction pending a decision on his appeal.

Several student groups rallied outside the Supreme Court
building in Central Jakarta on Wednesday demanding that the court
send Akbar to jail. Previously, other protesters had demanded
that the court acquit Akbar, who is also the Golkar Party
chairman.

Supreme Court security guards said they expected more
demonstrations on Thursday.

Akbar was found guilty of misusing State Logistics Agency
(Bulog) funds intended for the food-for-the-poor program when he
was the minister/state secretary in 1999.

The inordinate delay in the deciding of Akbar's case -- his
appeal was filed in the middle of last year -- has sparked
widespread speculation of backroom deals and political intrigue
marring the judicial process.

Some legal experts have criticized the prosecutors for
presenting a weak and poorly drafted indictment against Akbar,
and for failing to follow the money trail to its ultimate
destination.

The courts throughout failed to look into the question of
whether the money ended up in Golkar Party coffers, even though
it found that Akbar, who was minister/state secretary under then
president B.J. Habibie, received the funds in February 1999,
months before Golkar contested that year's general election.

Akbar persistently claimed both in and out of court that he
had intended the Rp 40 billion to be used to feed the poor and
that he transferred it to the Raudlatul Jannah Foundation for
that purpose.

According to the prosecution, this foundation never received
the money and, in fact, probably never even existed.

Winfried Simatupang, who was said to be in charge of the
phantom project, later claimed he had stashed the Rp 40 billion
in cash under his bed.

During the course of the trial, he paid the money back by
installment.

The judges, who appeared eager to accept the unlikely tale at
face value, sentenced Winfried to three years in prison, far less
than the maximum penalty of between 20 years and life
imprisonment. The Jakarta High Court later upheld the conviction.

The same court also dismissed appeals by Akbar's two
accomplices in the same case.

In deciding an appeal case, the Supreme Court does not decide
on the validity of the evidence. Instead, it confines itself to
examining whether the two lower courts have properly applied the
law, Chief Justice Bagir Manan said.