Corruption probe to target BNI directors
Eva C. Komandjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Over a year into their investigation into a lending scam involving Bank Negara Indonesia that caused some 1.7 billion (US$170 million) in state losses, the National Police are now directing their attention to the bank's board of directors.
In the case, fictitious letters of credit were issued by the Kebayoran Baru branch of BNI in 2003 to suspects linked to PT Gramarindo.
Insp. Gen. Yusuf Manggabarani, who leads the special investigative team assigned to the scandal, said on Monday top officials of state-owned BNI may have been involved in producing the fake letters of credit.
"There must be someone at BNI's headquarters who authorized the disbursement of money from the Kebayoran Baru branch," he said.
It was agreed that the bank's board of directors would be questioned after National Police chief Gen. Sutanto formed the special team to investigate alleged power abuse by a previous team of police officers led by Brig. Gen. Samuel Ismoko in investigating the BNI case.
Ismoko, who was a former fraud squad director, and his subordinate Sr. Comr. Irman Santosa have been declared suspects in the power abuse case. But only Irman is being detained.
"We haven't arrested Ismoko yet because we have to be careful in the investigation. We will cross check his statement with Adrian Waworuntu at Cipinang Penitentiary today (Monday)," Yusuf said.
Adrian, a businessman, was convicted recently of involvement in the BNI lending scam and sentenced to life by the South Jakarta District Court.
Yusuf said his team would also summon 15 other subordinates of Ismoko from the police's fraud squad division, which investigated the bank scandal, over the same power abuse charges.
"We will do it one by one, and don't worry we will investigate them all," Yusuf promised.
Ismoko is accused of acting beyond his authority by giving the bank fraud suspects, including Adrian Waworuntu, special treatment and taking bribes from them in the form of notebook computers and cellular phones.
The one-star police general had earlier been tried by the police's disciplinary committee, which barred him from involvement in investigating cases for a year. However, no criminal charges were leveled against him.
Ismoko was transferred from the operational division at National Police Headquarters after being replaced as the fraud squad director. Now, he is an advisor to National Police chief Gen. Sutanto.
The police have questioned a total of 22 suspects, including police officers, businesspeople and bankers, in relation to the BNI case.
Separately, Sutanto said a joint team of police officers and prosecutors had managed to seize Adrian's assets worth $12 million in Los Angeles, the United States.
The asset-tracing team is also striving to secure corruption assets totaling US$5.2 million in Switzerland, which belong to a money laundering suspect identified by his or her initials as EN, who was allegedly implicated in a lending scam at the state-owned Bank Mandiri.
Apart from than, Sutanto said, the same team would also try to seize $855,000 from a Hong Kong bank account under the name of Lisa Santoso, the wife of Irawan Salim -- a fugitive graft suspect from the closed Bank Global.
Irawan himself also holds a bank account containing $500,000 in the same bank, the police chief added.