PPP to grill Tosari over investment in PT QSAR
Tiarma Siboro, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The Muslim-based United Development Party (PPP) is planning to grill its leader Tosari Wijaya over the party's alleged Rp 5 billion (US$5.6 million) investment in the now bankrupt profit- sharing agribusiness PT Qurnia Subur Alam Raya (QSAR).
Lukman Hakim Saifuddin, head of the party's education and training department, said on Sunday that party leaders would also establish whether or not Tosari, in his capacity as chairman of party's fund raising team, violated PPP's internal rules.
"There are two important points party leaders want Pak Tosari to clarify: The first is whether or not he holds the authority to take all necessary moves to raise funds for the party, and second whether or not he had secured the party's approval to invest the funds in QSAR," Lukman told reporters on the sidelines of the party's two-day meeting to discuss their stance over proposed political bills currently being deliberated at the House of Representatives (DPR).
Lukman, however, refused to disclose a time for his clarification session, only that it would be soon.
"We'll do it as soon as possible," he said.
Tosari, who is also a deputy speaker of the House, admitted that he invested some Rp 5 billion of PPP funds into QSAR and another Rp 1.5 billion from certain cooperatives under PPP.
He made his first public appearance on Saturday since news on QSAR's bankruptcy broke out several weeks ago.
Tosari, who looked emotional, disclosed to the press that the issue of PPP's investment in QSAR had been internally settled.
"Did you read the papers? Did you watch televisions? So why do you ask me about the (QSAR) matter?. There's no longer a problem with the party's funds. It's all been settled. We (the PPP) just wished to earn profits by investing our money in QSAR," Tosari said.
Asked if he had the authority to use party funds, Tosari replied: "That's not your business. I have made a clarification to the party's chairman (Vice President Hamzah Haz) and he agreed with me," he said without elaborating.
Tosari further said that he would repay the funds to the party, saying: "It's all my responsibility."
Tosari was reportedly one of QSAR's honorary board members and has maintained a good relationship with QSAR's president director Ramli Araby, who is currently being detained at the Sukabumi Police Precinct along with six other company directors. Which means if he QSAR would have been profitable he would have been entitled to profit-sharing personally, even though he had not "invested" his money the party's.
Ramli and other company directors have been declared as main suspects in the financial scandal on charges that they had misused some Rp 500 billion raised from 6,800 private investors.
Last Thursday, West Java police investigators questioned Tosari's wife Matsusoh about her role in QSAR. Matsusoh was reportedly the director of a QSAR subsidiary in Purbolinggo, East Java.
The questioning was to follow up Ramli's testimony that QSAR channeled some Rp 750 million to its subsidiary, PT Bromo Lestari Alam Raya (BAR), in which Matsusoh was a director.
Meanwhile, Muhammad Mirdasy, secretary of the PPP East Java chapter, told The Jakarta Post that Tosari had once instructed him to invest some Rp 250 million in party funds in the QSAR experiment.
"But since chairman Hafid Ma'soem and I, failed to get guarantees that the company was profitable, we refused to risk it with the party's money," Mirdasy said.