Kim Johannes may be charged again
Kim Johannes may be charged again
JAKARTA (JP): Minister of Finance Mar'ie Muhammad said
yesterday that the investigation of Kim Johannes, recently
acquitted from a corruption charge related to alleged fictitious
exports, could be reopened.
Speaking at a hearing with the Budgetary Commission of the
House of Representatives, the minister said that the Attorney
General's recent decision to drop the corruption charge against
Kim was not final.
"There might be another development," he said when answering a
House member's questions about the Attorney General's recent
decision to drop the corruption charge against Kim.
Attorney General Singgih said last week that the investigation
on Kim's possible involvement in the issuance of forged export
documents had been dropped due to the absence of adequate
evidence that Kim had inflicted a loss to the state.
Kim was charged with issuing counterfeit export documents to
illegally obtain import duty and value-added tax rebates from the
Export Service Facilitating Agency and to obtain subsidized
export credits from Bank Indonesia, the central bank.
The minister told yesterday's hearing that he has assigned
three top officials, Director General for Customs and Excise
Sahardjo, Tax Director General Fuad Bawazier and Director General
for Financial Institutions Bambang Subianto, to help the Attorney
General investigate Kim's possible involvement in bank or export
frauds.
Mar'ie said that the Ministry of Finance issued at least five
permits per week to the police or the Attorney General's Office
to investigate bank accounts of the people accused of bank
frauds.
"I am unable to explicitly disclose every case," the minister
said when he was questioned by Sri Bintang Pamungkas of the
United Development Party if the accounts of businessmen Robby
Tjahjadi and Lili Sumantri were also investigated.
Robby, the founder of the debt ridden Kanindotex and Sumantri,
a former banker, were recently reported to have incurred huge bad
debts at state-owned banks. (hen)