Former Pati Regent Sudewo Charged with Receiving Billions in Bribes

Non-active Pati Regent Sudewo has been charged with accepting bribes and gratuities amounting to billions of rupiah, linked to railway line construction projects within the Directorate General of Railways (DJKA) at the Ministry of Transportation and extortion related to the appointment of village officials in Pati. During the inaugural hearing at the Semarang Corruption Court on Monday (15/6), Sudewo arrived wearing a brown batik shirt under an orange detainee vest, under tight security. Public Prosecutor Joko Hermawan read out the indictment, charging Sudewo with receiving bribes and gratuities from the execution of several projects at the DJKA totalling Rp3.8 billion. According to Hermawan, the first indictment states that Sudewo, while serving as a member of House Commission V, received bribes and gratuities totalling Rp1.3 billion from project contractors and commitment-making officials for railway infrastructure projects between 2021 and 2023. Hermawan revealed that Sudewo received Rp450 million from Nur Hidayat, Commissioner of PT Mataram Inti Konstruksi, related to the Mojokerto-Surabaya double-track project (JGMS). In that project, Nur Hidayat obtained work through a joint operation mechanism with another construction provider and received a fee of Rp450 million, despite not executing any work in the joint operation. The defendant also allegedly received a bribe of Rp200 million from Ferry Septha Indrianto, Director of PT Indria Putra Persada, as a fee for the Solo-Semarang double-track project (JGSS 1) won by that company, and a bribe of Rp721 million from Dion Renato Sugiarto, Director of PT Istana Putra Agung. The prosecutor stated this sum was a 0.5 percent fee on the JGSS 6 project, which had a contract value of Rp143 billion. The prosecution also charged Sudewo with receiving gratuities in the form of cash and goods valued at a further Rp2.4 billion, also connected to DJKA projects, including Rp2.3 billion from Nur Hidayat.