Ometraco Multi Artha declared bankrupt
JAKARTA (JP): The Jakarta Commercial court declared PT Ometraco Multi Artha (OMA), a multifinance arm of the publicly listed PT Ometraco Corporation, bankrupt on Friday after its 28 creditors rejected the company's debt restructuring proposal.
Chief judge Haryono said that the bankruptcy decision, the second issued by the court since its opening in September, was made because debtor and creditors failed to reach agreement on the debt restructuring.
The court issued a temporary suspension of payments to OMA late September for 45 days and urged the company and its creditors to negotiate a debt rescheduling program during the period.
According to the new bankruptcy law, which was enacted in August, the court will issue a permanent suspension of the payment order if creditors and debtors succeed in debt negotiations but if they fail, the debtor will be declared bankrupt.
"The court turned down the proposal for a permanent suspension of payment by OMA and declared it bankrupt," Haryono said.
He also appointed supervisory judge Victor Hutabarat and curator William Edward Daniel of Warens & Achyar to take care of OMA's assets before the company is liquidated.
He ordered the firm to pay a five percent fee (of total assets) to the curator.
Daniel said that OMA, which has a total debt of US$178.5 million debt to its creditors, has total assets of Rp 500 billion (about $66 million)
Lawyer Kitty Sugondo Kramadibrata, who represented three foreign creditors, said Friday that the court had made a wise decision.
"I think the decision is fair as OMA did not show its best efforts to settle its mounting debts with the creditors during the temporary suspension of payment period," she said after the hearing.
Haryono said that the multifinance firm could not appeal to the Supreme Court to nullify the court's ruling as the existing law does not allow it to do so.
According to the bankruptcy law, a debtor can only appeal if it does not require a temporary suspension of payment.
In a most controversial ruling early last month, the Jakarta Commercial court declared property firm PT Modernland Realty, with assets of more Rp 1 trillion, bankrupt for its failure to pay a petty claim worth Rp 94.13 million (about $12,500) to two Indonesian property buyers Hussein Sani and Johan Subekti.
Bankruptcy lawyers criticized that court's decision as unwise as it was made when both the plaintiffs and the property firm were still working on debt renegotiation.
Modernland has proposed an appeal to the Supreme Court to nullify the decision, and this is expected to be made in within next few weeks. (aly)