Petition filed against PSN, Aces

State-owned investment and securities firm PT Danareksa plans to file a bankruptcy petition against telecommunication firms PT Pasifik Satelit Nusantara (PSN) and PT Asia Cellular Satelit (Aces) over their unpaid loans to the company.

Danareksa president director Lin Che Wei said late on Monday the company had decided to do so because they had shown no interest in cooperating to settle their massive debts, which they obtained in 1998.

"We are now in the process of consulting our lawyers. We expect the bankruptcy petition process to be completed soon. The two companies are our biggest problem in settling our unpaid loans," said Lin.

PSN has a debt to Danareksa amounting in total of Rp 135 billion (about US$13.56 million), while Aces has some Rp 375 billion.

After taking the helm at Danareksa in July, Lin immediately decided to provide Rp 248.9 billion in the first semester of this year as a provision to cover the company's bad debts amounting to Rp 900 billion.

According to Lin, the bad debts were allegedly the result of various irregularities made by the previous managements. The company had already launched an investigative audit to try to uncover the problems. -- JP