Attorney General's Office Reveals Origins of Alleged Petral Corruption Causing State Losses
The Attorney General’s Office has designated seven suspects in the alleged corruption case at Pertamina Energy Trading Limited (Petral) from 2008 to 2015. The Attorney General’s Office has explained the circumstances of this case.
Director of Investigation for the Deputy Attorney General for Special Crimes (Dirdik Jampidsus) Syarief Sulaeman Nahdi stated that there are seven suspects in this case, one of whom is Muhammad Riza Chalid with initials MRC.
The other six suspects are a Marketing and Trading Manager at Pertamina’s Directorate of Marketing and Trading with initials BBG, Head of Trading at Pertamina Energy Services (PES) from 2012 to 2014 with initials AGS, Senior Trader at Petral from 2009 to 2015 with initials MLY, an individual with initials NRD, VP ISC at PT Pertamina with initials TFK, and a Director from companies owned by MRC with initials IRW.
This case began between 2008 and 2015 with the procurement of crude oil and refinery products. Through this procurement, one of the suspects leaked internal confidential information from Petral Energy Services (PES) to Muhammad Riza Chalid.
“The investigation team found facts of actions involving leaks of internal confidential information from PES or Petral Energy Services regarding crude oil needs, gasoline, and other information, carried out by one of the suspects,” said Syarief during a press conference at the Attorney General’s Office on Thursday (9/4/2026).
Syarief stated that Riza Chalid, together with IRW, influenced the Petral procurement process by lobbying Petral and Pertamina officials. Syarief said that in this procurement, there was collusion involving mark-ups on crude oil and Petral prices.
“So, essentially, Mr. MRC through Mr. IRW communicated with procurement officials both at Petral and Pertamina. This included with suspect BBG, Mr. IRW, MLY, and TFK. The communication involved conditioning the tender, providing HPS (Estimated Own Price) information, resulting in mark-ups or overpriced costs because the procurement became non-competitive,” he revealed.
Due to the lobbying by Riza Chalid and IRW, Pertamina officials issued guidelines deemed by the Attorney General’s Office to contradict Pertamina’s board meeting minutes.
“To accommodate the interests of Mr. MRC and Mr. IRW, in July 2012, suspects BBG, AGS, NRD, and MLY issued guidelines that contradicted the minutes of the Pertamina board meeting,” he said.
“After the tender was conducted in such a manner, PES, assisted by company YR, signed an MOU related to the supply of refinery products for 2012 to 2014,” he added.
Syarief revealed that the tender process for procuring crude oil and refinery products caused prices to soar. According to him, the actions of the suspects caused state losses. The Attorney General’s Office is currently calculating the amount of state losses.
“The tender or procurement process for crude oil and refinery products resulted in a longer supply chain and higher prices, especially for Gasoline 88 or what we know as Premium 88 and Gasoline 92, thus causing losses to PT Pertamina,” he said.
The suspects are alleged to have violated Article 2 and subsidiary Article 3 of the Law on the Eradication of Criminal Acts of Corruption. Five suspects have been detained in a detention centre for the next 20 days.