Police question three people for role in BNI scandal
Police question three people for role in BNI scandal
Abdul Khalik, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Police investigators intensively interrogated three persons on
Friday for their roles in the Rp 1.7 trillion Bank Negara
Indonesia (BNI) scandal.
National Detective Police chief Com. Gen. Erwin Mappaseng said
that police had arrested the director of PT Gramarindo Mega
Indonesia, Olla Abdullah Agam, the director of PT Metrantara,
Richard Kountul, and the director of PT Maqnetique Usaha Esa
Indonesia, and questioned them strenuously on Friday.
Mappaseng also said police would issue warrants for the arrest
of three suspects.
"We can only hold them for questioning them for 24 hours, so
we will have to issue warrants of arrest for them tonight,"
Mappasaeng said.
Police were not available on Friday evening to confirm whether
or not they had issued warrants of arrest for the three suspects.
PT Gramarindo Mega Indonesia, PT Metrantara and PT Maqnetique
Usaha Esa Indonesia are believed to have reaped billions of
rupiah from 41 fictitious letters of credit worth Rp 1.7 trillion
redeemed by state-owned BNI from 2002 through 2003.
Police had earlier declared five others as suspects. They are
head of BNI Kebayoran Baru branch Koesadiyono and its Foreign
Customer Division head Edy Santoso, owner of PT Basomasindo
Jeffry Baso, director of PT Pan Kifros Aprila Widharta, and Judhi
Basso of PT Bassamindo.
The scandal began when BNI's Kebayoran Branch in South Jakarta
granted export credits to eight Gramarindo and Petindo group
subsidiaries with L/Cs issued by banks in Kenya, Switzerland and
the Cook Islands as collateral. They claimed to be exporting
commodities to the Republic of Congo and Kenya. Without
conducting any formal assessments or checks, the branch disbursed
the export credits from Dec. 2002 through July 2003.
Police suspect that the bills attached to the L/Cs were
fraudulent, as the goods were never exported -- but the export
loans were channeled.
The prime suspect of the scandal, Maria Pauliene Lumowa, is
still at large in Singapore.
Erwin also said Friday that two officers of two foreign banks,
ABN Amro and Standard Charter, had been questioned as witnesses
over their roles in the process of issuing the alleged fraudulent
letters of credit.
"We can't specify the results of the cross check because we
need to put things together first. After this, we will also
question people at Citibank," he said.
The case became highly politicized when several media reported
this week that a large part of the money had been distributed to
three presidential candidates from the Golkar party. However,
Akbar Tanjung, the party chairman has denied the rumor.
National Police chief Gen. Da'i Bachtiar also denied the rumor
Friday, saying that police did not know of any money falling into
the hands of politicians.
"I think it comes from the media themselves and they
exaggerate the rumor. Anyway, we are trying to find out where the
money went," said Da'i.
Erwin said Friday that police investigators would refer to
several laws and regulations that may have been violated in the
scam, including Criminal Code Article 263 on document forgery,
law No. 10/1998 on banking, law No. 20/2001 on anticorruption and
law No. 15/2002 on money laundering, in order to net the
suspects.