Court freezes Senayan's assets

Urip Hudiono, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Central Jakarta District Court has slapped an asset preservation order on the management of Senayan Square complex in order to stop it disposing of assets before a court case began.

Acting on the order issued by Judge Mulyani on Oct. 15, court bailiff Jeri D. Rampen officially declared on Thursday the site's 20 hectares of land and all its buildings now under the court's supervision, pending a case between the state Bung Karno Sports Complex Management Board, and Senayan Square owners Kojima Overseas Asia Pte. Ltd, a Singapore-based subsidiary of Japanese real estate company Kojima Corporation.

The frozen assets include the upmarket Plaza Senayan mall, the Sentral Senayan office building, the Plaza Senayan apartment towers, their parking and food court buildings, and the Plaza Senayan Annex Living Stone building, which is currently under construction.

"Customers can still visit the shopping mall and tenants can still carry out their business as usual," said Teguh Budiono, the legal affairs manager of Senayan Square management PT Senayan Trikarya Sempana, an affiliate of Kojima.

Representatives of Kojima and Senayan Trikarya expressed their disappointment about the asset preservation order as they said they had never received a summons from the court.

The seizure was unnecessary as the assets were fixed and could not possibly be removed in an attempt to encumber the trial, they said.

The Bung Karno board filed a civil suit on Oct. 5 against Kojima, accusing it of reneging on its agreement in July 1989, which allowed Kojima to develop 20-hectares of the area under a 40-year build, operate and transfer (BOT) scheme, in return for the funding and construction of the Athletes Center.

Both parties had agreed to give 70 percent of Senayan Trikarya's to Kojima, while the board had received 10 percent. The remaining 20 percent is owned by developer PT Aditya Wirabakti.

Bung Karno board executive director Yasidi Hambali said the agreement was unfair. Kojima had yet to create the Athletes Center, while eight hectares of the site valued at US$34.39 million also remained undeveloped. The board also considered the Senayan Trikarya's annual rent payment for the site at only $400,000 as undervalued.

The board has demanded US$225 million in compensation for losses the state has suffered from the agreement.

Yasidi did not explain why the board had only recently begun to question the agreement.

Board lawyers said they ended up bringing the case to court after attempts to renegotiate the agreement failed, as Kojima and Senayan Trikarya said they could not do so without the consent of parent company Kojima Corporation.

Kojima and Senayan Trikarya, meanwhile, said the agreement had been in effect for 15 years without any previous complaints from the sports complex management board.