The Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) has presented parliament with its interim audit of Bank Century's burgeoning bailout, but has not made the results public.
A. Hafiz Zawawi, chairman of the House's Commission XI, which oversees financial affairs, said Monday the results might be kept out of the public eye until the full audit was complete.
"It will likely remain confidential, because the BPK doesn't think it's finished yet," he said. "They're worried it might be premature to publish the audit results at this stage."
Hafiz said Commission XI would officially be given the audit results at a House plenary session scheduled for Tuesday, which it would study before presenting to another plenary session on Wednesday - the last such meeting of the current House.
The audit is expected to help determine whether the government bailed out Century to avert a more dire risk to the economy, or whether the action was motivated by vested interests, said legislators, who had called for the BPK audit.
Century was bailed out at a cost of Rp 6.76 trillion (US$676 million) - far higher than the initially estimated Rp 632 billion.
This sparked a huge outcry over why a relatively small bank deserved had to be bailed out with such an exorbitant amount of money.
"We want *the audit* to be done thoroughly," said House Speaker Agung Laksono.
"If any crime has taken place, it must be processed *legally*. And whoever is implicated should be processed objectively."
Hafiz, however, pointed out the current House members had little time to follow up on the audit.
"We'll make recommendations for the next House to follow up on," he said. "We don't want them to leave this case or cover it up."
The next House will be dominated by legislators from President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's Democratic Party. Speculation is rife that Century was saved to protect depositors who were major financiers of Yudhoyono's recent presidential campaign.
The government insists no such vested interests are at play, saying the bailout was made purely to prevent a threat to the banking sector had it allowed Century to fold.
The BPK is set to present its full and final audit on Oct. 19.
On Monday, the House's Commission XI and the government also discussed a bill on the financial system stability committee (JPSK) to replace the existing regulation-in-lieu-of-law on the JPSK.
The bill will define what constitutes a systemic threat to the country's financial sector and decide who is authorized to take measures against it.
Legislator Dradjad H. Wibowo said the House and the government had debated Article 31 that read, "When the law takes effect, regulation-in-lieu-of-law No. 4/2008 on the JPSK must be revoked and no longer be effective."
"That means the government thinks the regulation is still effective even now, while the House refused to approve it back on Dec. 18 *2008*," he said.
"If the regulation was in effect, there would be no Century fiasco."
