Fact-finding team to assess charges on KPK leaders

Irawaty Wardany ,  The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Fri, 11/06/2009 10:47 AM  |  National

The presidential fact-finding team is scheduled to reconstruct the charges against two suspended antigraft deputies on Saturday to assess whether the ongoing criminalization was fabricated.

The case reconstruction will be conducted in the presence of National Police chief Gen. Bambang Hendarso Danuri, Attorney General Herdarman Supandji and police investigators.

“We hope we can come up with a conclusion on whether this case is real or fabricated,” the eight-member fact-finding team chairman Adnan Buyung Nasution told reporters here on Thursday.

The team on Thursday sought clarification from current leaders of the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), the two suspended KPK leaders Bibit Samad Rianto and Bibit Chandra, and Anggodo Wijojo, the younger brother of graft fugitive Anggoro Wijojo, and were today slated to do the same with Comr. Gen. Susno Duadji who reportedly resigned from his position as chief detective of the National Police.

Anggodo and Susno were two of many people, including officials from the National Police and the Attorney General’s Office, who were involved in the alleged criminalization, caught on recordings, of the two KPK deputies in their apparent attempt to halt the antigraft body’s investigation into communication company PT Masaro Radiocom belonging to Anggoro.

The recordings were played in hearings at the Constitutional Court on Tuesday and Wednesday in reviewing the 2002 KPK Law.

Masaro was allegedly involved in the markup of the procurement of an integrated radio communication system device at the Forestry Ministry in 2007, which incurred Rp 180 billion (US$19 million) in losses to the state.

The graft case was revealed during the trial of former lawmaker Yusuf Erwin Faishal, who was convicted for two separate bribery cases, namely the conversion of the protected forest for commercial use in Tanjung Api-api in Banyuasin, South Sumatra, as well as the radio procurement project.

Yusuf was sentenced to four-and-a-half years’ imprisonment for receiving Rp 775 million and Rp 125 million respectively in bribes in the case.

The police have accused Bibit and Chandra of abusing their power, receiving bribes and extorting Anggoro, with scant evidence.

Public suspicion that the case was fabricated was strengthed when the Constitutional Court ordered the KPK to play voice recordings that revealed the role of Anggodo who was in active communication with officials from the National Police and the AGO in an attempt to fabricate a case against the KPK deputies.

The officials included assistant attorney general for intelligence Wisnu Subroto and several police investigators.

The recordings also mentioned Ritonga, referring to Deputy Attorney General Abdul Hakim Ritonga who announced his resignation on Thursday to, as he described it, salvage the damaged reputation of
the AGO.

Susno and I Ketut Sudiharsa, chairman of the Witness and Victims Protection Agency (LPSK), also featured in the taped conversations.

Several members threatened to resign on Thursday because Susno and Anggodo have not yet been detained as suspects in the case despite overwhelming evidence against them.

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