Hundreds of village heads may face jail

CILACAP: Police threatened on Wednesday to detain hundreds of village heads in Cilacap regency, Central Java for giving complicated testimonies in a graft case.

"The village heads gave inconsistent statements. If they continue to give inconsistent statements, we would detain them," Banyumas police detectives chief Comr. Syarif Rahman said, adding that the officials would be summoned for questioning again next week.

Syarif said some of the village heads claimed the village Internet project was initiated by villagers while the others claimed that the project was proposed by the regency administration.

Police earlier said 240 villages in the regency received Rp 100 million (US$10,000) each for the village allocation fund.

But half of the fund was then used for the Internet project in the village office.

Up until the end of 2008, the project was never initiated. Instead, village heads purchased just one computer, a printer and a table, worth a total of only Rp 10 million.

Police found that every village head received an average of Rp 2.5 million in cash each, district heads recieved between Rp 7 million to Rp 10 million. "They have returned *the money* to the police as evidence," Syarif said. - JP