House told to question Marzuki over Baligate

House told to question Marzuki over Baligate

JAKARTA (JP): Experts on Monday called for an investigation
into reports that officials from the Attorney General's Office,
including Attorney General Marzuki Darusman, had taken bribes to
acquit prime suspect Djoko S. Tjandra from all charges.

Interviewed by The Jakarta Post, coordinator of Indonesian
Corruption Watch (ICW) Teten Masduki, lawyer Trimedya Panjaitan
and economist Sri Mulyani stressed the need for the House of
Representatives (DPR) to call upon Marzuki to clarify the bribery
allegations.

"The DPR should call upon Marzuki to examine how much truth
there is in these rumors. If there are indications (of
corruption), the case must be prosecuted by the police," Teten
said.

"Should the police find evidence that the Attorney General, or
any of his officials, took bribes to free Djoko, the officials
concerned should be asked to resign."

The bribery allegations were brought to the attention of the
media by a number of former prosecutors recently.

As reported earlier, the South Jakarta District Court freed
Djoko on a legal technicality and the prosecution's failure to
back up its case with witnesses.

Djoko is a director of trading and investment firm PT Era Giat
Prima (EGP), which had taken over Bank Bali's interbank loans
from closed Bank Dagang Nasional Indonesia (BDNI). Djoko was
charged with improperly influencing certain officials, including
suspended Bank Indonesia (central bank) governor Sjahril Sabirin,
to disburse Rp 904 billion in repayment of the loans.

Separately, lawyer Trimedya Panjaitan condemned Marzuki for
asking the National Ombudsman Committee to investigate the
bribery allegations, instead of preparing a solid indictment
against Djoko in the trial.

"The responsibility of the Attorney General's Office was to
present a solid indictment against Djoko Tjandra. The indictment
was weak, while the prosecutors selected did not seem to
understand the case," Trimedya said.

"The Attorney General should have conducted an internal
investigation of prosecutor Antasari Azhar for demanding only 18-
months imprisonment for Djoko."

"Why was Antasari instead promoted to the position of head of
the South Jakarta Prosecutor's Office?"

Teten added that despite what the public thought, he saw the
facts of the Bank Bali case as being very straightforward.

"The January 1999 cessie (assignment of rights) contract was
used as an instrument to commit corruption," Teten said.

He added that law enforcers were looking at the case as if it
were a civil case while in fact corruption was a highly developed
practice which made use of laws, decrees and the government
apparatus to illicitly obtain state funds.

"Bank Indonesia (BI) director Erman Munzir had initially
issued a letter to delay the disbursement of Rp 904 billion to
Bank Bali, since he considered the amount excessively large and
stated that the government should only disburse Rp 495 billion,
which was the exact amount needed to recoup Bank Bali's interbank
loans from BDNI," Teten said.

"Instead, Rp 904 billion was disbursed. Of that amount, Rp 546
billion went to PT EGP. Bank Bali was left with only Rp 358
billion. The Rp 546 billion 'commission' was paid to PT EGP for a
job it never actually did, namely recouping the funds."

"Is this not a crime?"

He added that the prosecution had also failed to follow the
trail of the money from PT EGP to Bank Indonesia or its
officials.

Economist Sri Mulyani said it was clear the prosecutor had a
very weak case against defendant Djoko and that the 18-month jail
term demanded by the prosecutor did not "make any sense".

"We were all shocked with the prosecutor's demand. Public
pressure is needed to do something about the verdict on Djoko. If
there is bribery within the Attorney General's Office or the
South Jakarta District Court, then it is a fatal mistake which
could result in a popular backlash," Mulyani said.

The court proceedings involving prime suspect Djoko began with
a surprising choice of prosecutor and ended with allegations of
bribes being paid to the 30-million-strong Nahdlatul Ulama
organization, formerly chaired by President Abdurrahman Wahid, as
well as to officials in the Attorney General's Office and the
South Jakarta District Court.

Prosecutor Ridwan Moekiat, who became a favorite whipping boy
of the media for his irrelevant questioning during the
examination of 50 of the 56 witnesses in the case, has allegedly
been previously implicated in a corruption scandal involving the
selling of court evidence in the form of land worth billions of
rupiah.

Ridwan asked for early retirement, and was replaced by
Antasari Azhar, who only got to examine six witnesses. (ylt)