Former NTB Economic Bureau Chief Withdraws Pre-Trial Motion in Mask Corruption Case

Former Head of the Economic Bureau of the West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) Regional Secretariat, Wirajaya Kusuma, has withdrawn a pre-trial motion filed with the Mataram District Court. The withdrawal came after the pre-trial motion of former Sumbawa Deputy Regent Dewi Noviany was rejected. Both are suspects in the alleged corruption of a COVID-19 mask procurement in 2020.

In Wirajaya Kusuma’s pre-trial motion, the respondents were the Mataram Police and the Mataram District Prosecutor’s Office. This was the same as the respondents in the pre-trial motion previously filed by Dewi Noviany, the sister of former NTB Governor Zulkieflimansyah.

Wirajaya’s legal counsel, Burhanuddin, stated that the withdrawal of the pre-trial motion was intended to remove the Mataram Prosecutor’s Office as a respondent. “I requested that the prosecutor’s office be removed as the second respondent. However, the judge did not grant this request, so we decided to withdraw the motion first,” Burhanuddin said on Thursday (9/7/2026).

Burhanuddin admitted to concerns that Wirajaya’s pre-trial motion would suffer the same fate as Dewi Noviany’s because it named the Mataram Prosecutor’s Office as a respondent. A new pre-trial motion will be filed in the near future. “So, purely, the party we will sue is the Mataram Police,” he revealed.

According to Burhanuddin, the Mataram Prosecutor’s Office has currently only received the first stage of the case transfer. The prosecutor’s office has not yet received the handover of the suspect and evidence from investigators of the Mataram Police Criminal Investigation Unit. “We know that the prosecutor’s office has only received the first stage of the transfer. However, the panel of judges held a different opinion. The action we previously accused the prosecutor’s office of was only regarding the receipt of the first stage transfer. Meanwhile, we maintain that the suspect designation is unlawful. But I was worried, because the previous ruling was like that (rejecting Dewi Noviany’s motion). That is why I withdrew it,” he said.

Separately, Mataram District Court Public Relations Officer Kelik Trimargo confirmed that Wirajaya Kusuma had withdrawn the pre-trial motion filed through his legal counsel. The withdrawal was submitted verbally and in writing on 7 July 2026. “The applicant did not wish to continue the pre-trial motion on the grounds that there were improvements to be made to the application letter,” Kelik stated.

Wirajaya’s motion had not yet reached the response or evidentiary stages. “Therefore, the single judge considered the withdrawal of the pre-trial motion to be justified and it was granted,” he said.

Wirajaya Kusuma and Dewi Noviany were named suspects in the corruption of mask procurement at the Cooperatives, Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises Office alongside four others. The other suspects are Rabiatul Adawiyah, who is Wirajaya Kusuma’s wife; former NTB Tourism Office Secretary Chalid Tomassoang Bulu; and two others, Kamaruddin and M Haryadi Wahyudin. They are currently not detained. The Mataram Police Criminal Investigation Unit previously suspended their detention. The case files for the suspects were declared complete in April 2026, but the second stage, the handover of suspects to prosecutors, has not yet been carried out.

The mask procurement had a budget of Rp 12.3 billion sourced from the NTB Cooperatives and SMEs Office’s Unforeseen Expenditure. The state loss was calculated at Rp 1.58 billion by the NTB Financial and Development Supervisory Agency. At the time of the procurement, the suspects held different positions and roles. Wirajaya Kusuma was the Head of the NTB Cooperatives and SMEs Office. Kamaruddin was the commitment-making official, Chalid Tomassoang Bulu was the Head of the SMEs Division at the NTB Cooperatives and SMEs Office, M Hariyadi Wahyudin was a staff member in the SMEs Division, and Rabiatul Adawiyah was a staff member at the NTB Trade Office. Dewi Noviany was the Head of the Administration Sub-Division at the Regional Financial and Asset Management Agency’s Asset Division.