Police extend detention of suspect in BNI scam
Police extend detention of suspect in BNI scam
Abdul Khalik, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The National Police have extended the detention of Edi Santoso,
one of the key suspects in the Bank National Indonesia (BNI)
scandal, for another 30 days to assist the investigation.
"We will follow the standard procedure by notifying the
Attorney General's Office that we will detain Edi for another 30
days as we need to question him further," National Police deputy
spokesman Brig. Gen. Soenarko said on Tuesday.
Edi has been detained by the police since Oct. 3. According to
the law, he should be handed over to the Attorney General's
Office within 30 days of his first being taken into police
custody, provided that the police have not submitted a letter
extending his detention.
Soenarko also said that the police had submitted application
letters to begin their investigations (SPDP) to the Attorney
General's Office right after the suspects were arrested.
"The claim that we haven't submitted the suspects' SPDPs to
the Attorney General's Office in the BNI case is not true," said
Soenarko.
Soenarko also denied suggestions that no progress had been
made in the case over the Idul Fitri holiday.
"We kept on investigating the case during the holiday. We even
summoned three directors of BNI last week to get more information
about the case," he said.
However, he declined to mention the names of the three BNI
directors or the results of the investigation so far.
The BNI scandal centers around 41 bogus letters of credit
worth Rp. 1.7 trillion that BNI passed on to a number of
subsidiary companies of the Gramarindo Group, which were claiming
they were exporting commodities to a number of African countries.
Police have been investigating the case for three months and
have detained 12 suspects so far. But the main suspect, Maria
Pauline Lumowa, the owner of the Gramarindo Group, is still at
large in Singapore.
The lack of significant disclosures about the three-month
investigation has raised doubts among the public at large despite
the arrests.
Rumors have been rife that several politicians from the Golkar
Party are implicated in the case. Three Golkar party presidential
aspirants -- Gen. (ret) Wiranto, Golkar party chairman Akbar
Tanjung, and Coordinating Minister for People's Welfare Jusuf
Kalla -- have all denied the rumors.