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AGO poor performance failed to follow up on cases: KK

The Commission for Public Prosecution (KK) has expressed dissatisfaction with the Attorney General's Office's (AGO) performance over the past three years, saying it has not responded appropriately to KK reports into criminal cases

Dian Kuswandini (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Wed, December 24, 2008

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AGO poor performance failed to follow up on cases: KK

T

he Commission for Public Prosecution (KK) has expressed dissatisfaction with the Attorney General's Office's (AGO) performance over the past three years, saying it has not responded appropriately to KK reports into criminal cases.

Commissioner Maria Ulfah Rombot said in Jakarta on Tuesday the commission regretted the action taken by the AGO over four of its senior prosecutors implicated in a high-profile bribery case.

The accused -- former assistant attorney general for special crimes Kemas Yahya Rahman, former investigation director for special crimes Muhammad Salim, former head of the East Jakarta Prosecutor's Office Joko Widodo and former assistant general for civic and state administrative affairs Untung Udji Santoso -- all received light punishments despite their roles in a scandal involving Bank Indonesia liquidity support (BLBI) funds.

"The decisions were made without our recommendation. But (the decisions) are not final yet. We already asked the AGO to send us the reports of their investigations into the prosecutors. Our recommendations could change the decisions," Maria said.

She said the fact that only a handful of KK reports had been followed up by the AGO with internal investigations demonstrated the latter's lack of committment to combating graft.

"Honestly, there have been hundreds of public reports we have sent to Attorney General Hendarman Supandji for a follow up, but hardly anything has been done at all," she said.

This year, the AGO followed up 11 of the 251 cases, five of which are still under investigation. This figure is less than 2007 where 42 of 227 cases were investigated, and 2006 where 48 of 204 cases were looked into.

"We had to first carry out our own pre-investigation into the complaints," Maria said.

She said poor performance on behalf of prosecutors had drawn the largest number of complaints from the public this year.

"Cases related to prosecutors' poor performance made up 169 of the cases this year, while the remaining 82 were about prosecutors' misconduct," she said.

The commission deems disgraceful misconduct as acts involving bribery, extortion and deceit.

"Some of the most controversial cases we handled included the manipulation of a verdict in North Sumatra, the selling of evidence in Nganjuk, East Java, and a case of contempt of court in Yogyakarta."

The commission also recorded that the Jakarta High Prosecutor's Office received the largest number of complaints with 88 cases, followed by North Sumatra and West Sumatra, both with 58 cases.

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