Legal experts warn that light sentences will not stop corruption

Muninggar Sri Saraswati The Jakarta Post Jakarta

Legal experts warned law enforcers that their reluctance to view corruption as a serious crime would make the country incapable of fighting corruption.

Lawyer Todung Mulya Lubis and National Ombudsman chief Antonius Sujata shared the same opinion that light sentences given by the courts to corruptors -- reflecting the ignorance of members of the judiciary -- would fail to act as a deterrent to other corruptors.

"Corruptors will learn that corruption is tolerable. The facts have shown that some of them can still earn big money without fearing the sentence, which is very light," Todung told The Jakarta Post on Saturday.

"Light sentences would only deter a small number of them; it is much better to prevent more people from committing corruption," Antonius said.

The former prosecutor said the first two verdicts -- on Hendrawan Haryono and David Nusa Wijaya -- would affect other Bank Indonesia Liquidity Support Fund (BLBI) misuse cases, which are now on trial in several district courts here.

"The two verdicts would become precedents for other, similar cases," he said.

Last year, the state lost its first legal battle against BLBI corruption after the South Jakarta District Court acquitted defendant Hendrawan from graft in misusing Rp 583.4 billion (US$58.34 million) of the fund. He was convicted only for violating banking laws.

The court sentenced him to one year in jail and ordered the former deputy director of now-defunct Bank Aspac to repay Rp 500 million or spend another three months in prison.

Prosecutors earlier demanded that the court sentence the defendant to five years imprisonment and ordered the return of the Rp 583.4 billion to the state.

A questionable verdict was delivered again at the West Jakarta District Court, which last week convicted David, former president of the now-defunct Bank Umum Servitia, of corruption for misusing Rp 1.27 trillion of BLBI. But he was only sentenced to one year in jail and fined Rp 30 million.

The verdict, however, raised public suspicions of foul play in the case, as prosecutors had earlier demanded the court sentence the defendant to four years in jail.

Presiding Judge P.A. Sianipar insisted the term was commensurate with the crime as the defendant was willing to repay the money misused.

The short sentence given by the panel of judges was considered by many to allow David time to collect the funds he had misused.

Due to both light sentences, Antonius called on prosecutors to appeal to a higher court in an effort to get punishments that fitted the crime.

"A judge should hand down punishments that will prevent the recurrence of similar crimes," he said.

Currently, 10 defendants are being tried in relation to BLBI violations. They are former Bank Indonesia directors and bankers from Bank Dagang Nasional Indonesia, Bank Modern, Bank Umum Servitia, Bank Umum Nasional, Bank Harapan Sentosa and Bank Aspac.

The government, through the central bank, disbursed Rp 144.5 trillion from August 1997 to early 1999 to 48 commercial banks during the monetary crisis.

Ironically, the Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) stated in May 1999 that BLBI misappropriation was merely manipulation, although it caused the state to lose about 95 percent of the funds.

The government announced two years ago that it would send about 80 BLBI abuse suspects to court in the hope of punishing them, as well as recovering the funds.