Fire destroys important documents at BPKP office
Fire destroys important documents at BPKP office
JAKARTA (JP): Documents related to the alleged "mishandling"
of multibillion dollar emergency supports from Bank Indonesia
have allegedly turned into ashes in a fire that gutted the third
floor of the Development and Finance Comptroller's (BPKP) office
here on Thursday afternoon.
BPKP executives and staff strongly believed that the incident
had been intentionally designed by parties aimed at destroying
the papers, most of which were kept at the third-floor offices of
the four-story building.
BPKP's deputy chief for administrative affairs Chatim Baidaei
quoted some of his staff as saying that some of them smelled fuel
on the third floor before the fire.
No fatalities were reported in the fire that started at 1:20
p.m.
Some 14 fire engines, including two from state oil firm
Pertamina, were dispatched to the site on the busy Jl. Hayam
Wuruk in Central Jakarta.
The firemen managed to extinguish the fire some four hours
later.
Until late in the evening, none of the BPKP executives could
be reached for confirmation of their findings concerning damages
from the fire.
Gambir subprecinct police chief, Asst. Supt. Slamet Rijanto,
only said that the fire was being investigated.
His men, he said, have began questioning a number of people,
including cleaning service workers and security guards at the
building.
Chatim suspected that the fire was arson.
"All data and documents related to the cases (the central
bank's liquidity support to ailing banks and state institutions),
particularly the new ones, had been stored on the gutted floor,"
Chatim advised.
He added that the floor was home to the offices of, among
others, BPKP head Arie Sulendro and deputies for special cases.
"But we hope that we have back-up copies since Acting Deputy
VII for special cases, Padmo Mihardjo, once proposed to film all
the data for security reasons," Chatim was quoted as saying by
Astaga.com.
The alleged mishandling of the government's Rp 144.5 trillion
emergency loans is being investigated by the Supreme Audit Agency
with the help of other institutions, including BPKP.
The loans were supposed to be used by the banks to reimburse
depositors' money. But BPK said in its recent report that the
banks used the money for other purposes, including currency
speculation, lending to affiliated business groups and for
repaying subordinated loans.
The agency laid the blame for the misuse of the huge liquidity
credits squarely on the extremely poor quality of the central
bank's supervision.
The report said the central bank depended too much on off-site
supervision (assessing written reports), whereas many commercial
banks had manipulated their financial reports for years.
The loans have become a government obligation to the central
bank. The government will issue bonds to cover the debt, but it
wants to clarify first whether there was any wrongdoing in the
granting of the loans.
More than Rp 100 trillion of the loans were channeled to five
banks -- the nationalized Bank Central Asia (BCA), Bank Danamon
and the now defunct Bank Subentra, Bank Umum Nasional (BUN) and
Bank BDNI.
The previous government signed an agreement with the owners of
those banks defining a mechanism for payment of their
obligations, but the present government has said it would revise
the that agreement on grounds that it only benefited the former
bank owners at the expense of the state and taxpayers.
The Thursday fire reminds many of several fires in 1997 that
took place at the National Development Planning Board (Bappenas)
building, the Ministry of Finance complex, and the Bank Indonesia
(BI) building.
Police forensic experts concluded that those the three fires
were the work of arsonists and each of the incidents were
related. But the police have failed to identify any suspects or
masterminds behind the fires. (07/bsr)