Said named suspect in haj case
Eva C. Komandjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Former minister of religious affairs during the Megawati Soekarnoputri administration, Said Agil Hussein Al-Munawar was named a key suspect on Thursday in an alleged graft case involving hundreds of billions of rupiah collected from Muslim haj pilgrims.
Head of the inter-departmental corruption eradication team Hendarman Supandji, who is also the deputy attorney general for special crimes, said investigators found that Said was actively involved in the corruption scandal.
"Based on our investigation results, Said has violated the anticorruption laws, thus we have to declare him a suspect in this case," Hendarman told The Jakarta Post.
He was referring to Law No. 31/1999 on Corruption Eradication and Law No. 20/2001, an amendment of the previous law.
On Wednesday, the anticorruption eradication team also named Taufiq Kamil, the non-active director general of Islamic guidance and haj management at the religious affairs ministry, as a suspect in the same case.
"Both Said and Taufiq are responsible for (misappropriation) in the management of unused money from haj pilgrimage costs," Hendarman alleged.
However, he refused to detail the roles of the two suspects, but promised to explain it during a news conference scheduled for Friday.
"We will question him (Said) on Monday as a suspect and we will determine whether to detain him or not after the questioning," Hendarman said.
He said he had notified the immigration office to issue travel bans on the two suspects in order to prevent them from fleeing abroad or evading justice.
On Tuesday, the National Police decided to freeze the bank accounts belonging to the religious affairs ministry, with a total of Rp 684 billion (US$72 million) in them, which have been collected from prospective pilgrims.
The move came after the police received an audit report from the Development Finance Comptroller (BPKP), which revealed a series of irregularities by the ministry. The finding sparked suspicions of a major corruption scam.
Under Law No. 17/1999, the money should have been stored in a single account and managed properly for the pilgrims' benefits.
Starting from 2003 however, the funds were split into separate accounts and were being used for things unrelated to the haj pilgrimage affairs, such as salary bonuses, housing compensation and management funds for religion ministry officials.