Corruption probe may spread to other officials

JAKARTA (JP): Attorney General Andi Muhammad Ghalib said on Friday that his office could open an investigation of government officials after it looked into the wealth of former president Soeharto.

"We'll see later, after the investigation on Soeharto," Ghalib was quoted as saying by Antara in Aceh's capital, Banda Aceh. He was on a visit to the westernmost province when asked whether the investigation on Soeharto's wealth would involve current and former ministers.

"In any investigation, there is always a need to question other people, and we will question them," he said without elaborating further.

President B.J. Habibie on Wednesday assigned Ghalib to chair a government team charged with investigating the former president's wealth.

Minister of Justice Muladi said on Thursday that officials who had served with Soeharto, including Habibie, would have to fill out forms detailing their private wealth.

Muladi said the mistakes of the former regime could not only be blamed on Soeharto alone but were also the responsibility of all his ministers and ranking officials.

Calls for a wider corruption probe into officials serving under Soeharto, including Habibie, have been growing since Soeharto made a televised statement on Sept. 6 denying he had amassed a fortune worth trillions of rupiah over his 32 years in power.

The calls have come from current and former ministers, including several who had once served under Soeharto, academics and human rights and pro-democracy activists.

They said an expanded investigation would lend credence to the government's drive to fight corruption and help restore confidence in the country and its government.

"If the government's drive to fight corruption is genuine and not part of a political game, it should also investigate other officials, including Habibie and his colleagues," a former Soeharto aide, Emil Salim, said on the sidelines of a discussion on corruption at the University of Indonesia in Depok, West Java.

Emil, who leads the Civil Society Movement and was a leading figure demanding the ouster of Soeharto in May, added that he was also ready to be investigated. He served as minister of administrative reforms in 1973 and was in the government up until 1993 in several other positions, including minister of transportation and state minister of environment.

Habibie, a close ally of Soeharto for decades, was research and technology minister from 1978 until he was appointed vice president in March. He took over the presidency when Soeharto quit on May 21.

Lawyer and human rights activist Todung Mulya Lubis, who was also speaking at the university, said the House of Representatives should immediately draft laws to prevent officials from illicitly amassing wealth. "The law requires that government officials must report their wealth annually," Todung, who chairs the ethics board at the Indonesian Corruption Watch, said.

Meanwhile, a group of 100 protesters on Friday became the latest to join the calls for the Soeharto investigation to be expanded to cover all ministers who had served under him. The demonstrators, from the People's Solidarity for the Upholding of Justice, protested outside the Attorney General's Office in South Jakarta.

Separately, Soeharto was seen at a mosque on the grounds of the Bimantara headquarters in Central Jakarta for Friday prayers.

He reportedly looked unconcerned and smiled as he arrived with one of his six children, Bambang Trihatmodjo, a founder of the Bimantara group and who is at the center of a separate banking scandal inquiry.

In Bandung, West Java, National Mandate Party (PAN) chairman Amien Rais said the government-appointed team investigating Soeharto's wealth should "show they are serious in two weeks".

"If not, demonstrations might be staged again either by PAN or students," he said before inaugurating PAN's West Java branch.

He added that demonstrations were the only alternative, "wise" forms of expression so far regarding such issues. (byg/43)