Mega camp fends off bribery allegations
Apriadi Gunawan and Yuli Tri Suwarni, The Jakarta Post/Medan/Bandung
President Megawati Soekarnoputri's campaign teams in North Sumatra and West Java provinces have been rocked by allegations of vote-buying via an eyebrow-raising lending scheme involving three state-owned banks.
In North Sumatra, the provincial Election Supervisory Committee (Panwaslu) established a team on Tuesday to investigate the allegations that Megawati's campaigners offered low-interest, no-collateral loans to hundreds of state plantation workers in the province.
According to information received by Panwaslu, the president's campaign staff recently offered employees at state-run plantation companies here the cheap loans, which would be in breach of the Election Law, said Choking Susilo Sakeh, the chairman of Panwaslu in the province.
The plantation companies, including PT Perkebunan Nusantara II and III, operate in several regencies of the province. Choking said, while adding that hundreds of the plantation employees had registered for the loans with a group of people that they understood to be members of the Megawati campaign team.
The workers were instructed to take a letter given to them and they would receive the loans from Bank Artha Graha and Bank Mandiri in the province. The loans offered by the group range between Rp 1 million and Rp 5 million.
Choking said that some of the people who signed up for the loans were not employees of the companies, merely residents who live near the plantations.
The secretary of the newly formed Nationhood Coalition (including Golkar, PDI-P and PPP), which is campaigning on behalf of Megawati, Effendy Naibaho, denied the allegation.
"We've had no such program. The allegation is aimed at tarnishing Megawati's name ahead of the election," said Effendy.
It remains to be seen whether the loan maneuver was truly the work of the Megawati campaign team or whether it was a smear attempt against Megawati.
In West Java province meanwhile, a campaign spokesperson for frontrunning presidential candidate Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, raised the issue of a nearly identical loan scheme, only that the bank involved was state bank PT Bank Rakyat Indonesia (BRI).
Yudi Widiana Adi, a Susilo campaign worker, questioned why BRI was suddenly involved in such unprofitable lending practices, especially without collateral, just two weeks prior to election day on Sept. 20.
He said there were reports of thousands of people in Sumedang, Majalengka and Sukabumi regencies who had applied for the cheap loans for their "small- and medium-sized enterprises", with a Rp 3 million credit ceiling, after they were told that BRI was currently offering the scheme. In another odd twist, most of the people who have received the loans have been led to believe that if Megawati is elected, their debts would be written off, said Yudi.
"We do not oppose lending to small businesses, but why has the bank done this kind of scheme at this time, just two weeks away from election day," wondered Yudi, while urging Panwaslu to investigate the alleged scam.
Megawati's campaign spokesperson in West Java said he did not see why there should be any allegations. Edi Susiyanto, one of the provincial campaigners for Megawati, claimed that the bank had been offering these types of cheap loans for many years.
Secretary of the provincial Panwaslu, Teten Setiawan, said that he would investigate the report.
The alleged scandal comes at a time when banks nationwide are promoting loans to small businesses, however, with collateral and at standard market interest rates. Many bankers and economists believe such loans can be relatively risk-free and produce greater liquidity amid slow investment in the country.