Puteh to remain at the helm until declared suspect
Puteh to remain at the helm until declared suspect
Fabiola Desy Unidjaja, Jakarta
The police plan to question Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam governor
Abdullah Puteh would not, for the time being, affect his status
as civil emergency administrator, the government said on Sunday.
Ad interim coordinating minister for political and security
affairs Hari Sabarno said on Sunday that the police would
question Puteh as a witness, not as a suspect.
President Megawati Soekarnoputri would suspend the Governor
and appoint another official to administer the province only if
he were charged as a suspect and if there was a demand for his
suspension from the provincial legislative council, Hari said.
"It's quite common for people to be questioned as witnesses,"
he added.
Usually a governor who was unable to perform his duties would
be replaced by his deputy, the minister said. He was commenting
on the recent approval by the President for the police to
question Puteh in relation to graft allegations.
Puteh is said to have been involved in the markup of power
generators that were purchased in 2002, a scam that allegedly
defrauded the state of Rp 30 billion (US$3.3million).
Megawati's consent came just a few days after Puteh officially
became the civil emergency administrator in the province on May
20 after martial law ended on May 19.
Earlier, the martial law administrators had conducted
preliminary questioning of Puteh and submitted the case to the
National Police and the Attorney General's office.
The National Police's director of corruption cases, Brig. Gen.
Sugiri, said that Puteh was scheduled to be questioned early next
week.
"I just had the President's letter (of consent for the
questioning of Puteh) on my desk this morning. It's not easy to
arrange the questioning of such a senior official as Puteh, but
we will summon him early next week," Sugiri said on Saturday.
The allegations against Puteh are believed to have led to the
assigning of a government team "to advise" the governor in
administering the province under the state of civil emergency.
"To help monitor the use of funds, auditors from the State
Audit Agency will also help supervise spending," Hari said.
The government has come under fire for its failure to ensure
public accountability as regards the use of the funds provided
for the "integrated operations" under martial law, which were
supposed to have comprised military, humanitarian and law
enforcement operations.
Hari said that the team of special advisors to be sent to Aceh
would be briefed at his office on Tuesday and the presidential
instruction to appoint the officials would be signed by Megawati
"as soon as possible".