Ex-BNI officer gets life
Muninggar Sri Saraswati and Abdul Khalik, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
A legal observer and an anticorruption activist welcomed on Tuesday the unprecedented life sentence handed down to a former bank Bank BNI officer, but questioned law enforcers' overall commitment in solving the Rp 1.7 trillion (US$180 million) corruption case.
The South Jakarta District Court declared on Monday that Edi Santoso, former Foreign Customer Relations head of BNI Kebayoran Baru, was guilty of enriching himself and others by illegally disbursing Rp 1.7 trillion belonging to the state-owned bank.
Another defendant Koesadiyuwono, former BNI Kebayoran Baru branch manager, was sentenced to 16 years in prison on Monday for failing to prevent the scandal. He was also ordered to pay a fine Rp 500 million or serve an additional six months in prison.
Presiding judge Soedarto instructed state prosecutors to immediately detain the convicts as the trial adjourned. Lawyers of the two convicts appealed the verdict.
"The verdicts are in accordance with the financial damage suffered by the state, but we also know that many more people were involved in the scandal, some of whom have not yet been brought to justice," Luhut MP Pangaribuan said on Tuesday.
The scam began when officers from the BNI Kebayoran Baru branch in South Jakarta approved export loans to eight subsidiaries of the Gramarindo and Petindo Groups with letters of credit issued by banks in Kenya, Switzerland and the Cook Islands as collateral.
The letters of credit turned out to be fake, causing the state bank to suffer losses worth Rp 1.7 trillion.
Police named 17 suspects from BNI, Gramarindo and Petindo, but only seven, including Edi and Koesadiyuwono, have been put on trial.
Prime suspect Maria Pauline Lumowa managed to flee the country, while another person originally thought to be a key player, Adrian Waworuntu, was released due to lack of evidence.
Luhut warned that if both the National Police and the Attorney General's Office (AGO) failed to bring to justice other suspects, the long sentences handed down to Edi and Koesadiyuwono would not be adequate as a deterrent against corruption in the country.
"Instead, it would only confirm allegations of selective law enforcement, meaning not all people are treated equally before the law," Luhut, who is also a noted lawyer, told The Jakarta Post.
Deputy chairman of Indonesian Corruption Watch (ICW) Lucky Djani shared Luhut's opinion and expressed his dismay over the fact that law enforcers would boast about their success in sending some BNI corruptors to jail while releasing others thought to have a role.
"The police and prosecutors must prove that these two convicts have not been made the scapegoats to save the other suspects," he said. Lucky said that heavy sentences against a few corruptors in the BNI case would have a minimal impact in the drive against rampant corruption.
The verdicts, he said, were not a part of a systematic effort to stamp out corruption, given the fact that police have released some of the suspects without clear explanations and that the main suspect remains free in Singapore.
"We will never know whether the verdicts were purely based on legal arguments of the judges or not. But, it's a rare case, similar to the convictions of a number of councillors in West Sumatra," said Lucky, referring to some 40 legislature members who were found guilty of corruption.