IBRA: No bankruptcy suit for Djajanti

JAKARTA (JP): A senior official of the Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency (IBRA) said on Sunday the agency thus far has no plans to file a bankruptcy petition against plantation and fishery concern Djajanti Group.

"Until today, we have not made any plans to file a bankruptcy petition against the company. What we have done thus far is give signals for the company to engage in more serious talks on its debt restructuring program," IBRA's senior vice president and general counsel asset management credit Agustus A Nugroho told The Jakarta Post.

Nugroho said the letter IBRA sent to the company stating that the agency would confiscate the company's asset, Djajanti Plaza, unless the latter made a Rp 206.5 billion (US$23.7 million) cash payment, was a sort of call for the company to be more serious in thinking about its debt restructuring program.

"With the letter, we wanted to urge the company to engage in discussions at a more serious level," Nugroho said.

According to Nugroho, Djajanti, one of the 21 largest obligors whose debts have been taken over by IBRA, has a total debt of about Rp 5 trillion, including unpaid interest.

IBRA demanded Djajanti pay Rp 279 billion up front to demonstrate its cooperative attitude.

But, Djajanti said it did not have that amount of money and proposed providing Rp 25 billion in the first cash payment and paying the rest in installments over three years. Later, it raised the first cash payment to Rp 50 billion.

But, Nugroho said IBRA was not satisfied with the latest proposal.

"We are ready for discussions with the company as long as it is cooperative," Nugroho said.

Djajanti's commissioner Effendi Sasrawijaya earlier complained that IBRA had always ignored Djajanti's proposals and none of IBRA's decision makers were willing to meet with the company's executives for talks on its debt restructuring program.

Djajanti which has 70 percent of its plantation and fishery plant assets in Maluku and Irian Jaya is now facing difficulties in its operations following the one-and-a-half-year long religous violence in Maluku and the rising separatist movement in Irian Jaya.

Djajanti employs about 50,000 people in Maluku and Irian Jaya, including a large number of local poeple. (jsk)