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'€˜It all started with golf lessons'€™: Disgraced SKKMigas chief

Going down: Suspended head of Upstream Oil and Gas Regulatory Special Task Force (SKKMigas) Rudi Rubiandini responds to questions from journalists, after being questioned by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) over allegations of receiving bribes from Singapore-based oil trader Kernel Oil

Amahl S. Azwar (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Tue, August 27, 2013

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'€˜It all started with golf lessons'€™: Disgraced SKKMigas chief

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span class="inline inline-center">Going down: Suspended head of Upstream Oil and Gas Regulatory Special Task Force (SKKMigas) Rudi Rubiandini responds to questions from journalists, after being questioned by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) over allegations of receiving bribes from Singapore-based oil trader Kernel Oil. JP/Jerry Adiguna

'€œIt all started with golf. If I had not begun to learn to play golf, then I wouldn'€™t have got caught in this kind of situation,'€ said Rudi Rubiandini, the suspended chief of Upstream Oil and Gas Regulatory Special Task Force (SKKMigas) who was recently arrested over bribery allegations.

Rudi spoke on Monday to journalists who paid him a visit at the Corruption Eradication Commission'€™s (KPK) detention center in Central Jakarta. It was the first interview he had given to the media since his arrest on Aug. 13.

Along with Rudi, KPK investigators also arrested Deviardi aka Ardi, Rudi'€™s golf instructor who is suspected of being the middleman between the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) professor and Simon G. Tanjaya, an official with Singapore-based oil trader Kernel Oil. Simon has also been detained for allegedly paying the bribe.

Golf is a favorite pastime for high-ranking officials and business executives in the country. It is very common for business deals to be sealed over a round or two of golf.

Rudi, however, did not provide details about his relationship to Ardi, although speculation has been rife that the golf trainer was introduced to Rudi by Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Jero Wacik, a Democratic Party politician known to be close to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono.

Ardi reportedly made claims that he was Rudi'€™s secretary at SKKMigas to his colleagues, including the director of Kernel Oil, Singapore-based Widodo Ratanachaithong.

In a recent statement, Widodo, while acknowledging that Ardi was his acquaintance, denied that the company employed the golf coach to bribe Rudi as a way to expand its business, contradicting an earlier statement made by Kernel Oil'€™s lawyer in Indonesia, Junimart Girsang.

But Rudi did admit on Monday that Ardi, along with Simon, visited his house in South Jakarta the evening the KPK investigators searched his home in a surprise raid. According to Rudi, the golf instructor came to his house for a casual conversation.

'€œI did not know at the time there was money in Ardi'€™s golf bag. While he was in my house, the KPK investigators knocked on my door,'€ he said.

Rudi, however, denied that he knew Simon, although he did say that he had known about '€œKernel Oil'€™s executives in Singapore for some time'€. Rudi insisted that his previous meetings with Kernel'€™s executives, which he said had taken place in Singapore, were merely technical consultations concerning Indonesia'€™s oil industry.

'€œI am not an angel or a holy man, but one thing is for sure: I have never committed fraud. I never demand or blackmail oil and gas contractors for money,'€ he said.

Rudi was caught accepting US$690,000 and S$127,000 from Simon on Aug. 13 and, after further investigations, KPK investigators also seized US$320,100 from Rudi'€™s deposit box in a bank in Jakarta.

Commenting on this, Rudi only said he would not stand in the way of the ongoing investigation and that his official wealth report would vindicate him.

He also denied that he was responsible for a recently circulated text message that the bribe was intended to fund the Democratic Party'€™s convention.

Rudi said that while in detention he was not even allowed a cellular phone.

The disgraced official added that he had received threats demanding to step down as head of the interim regulator, which was formed to replace the now-defunct BPMigas.

BPMigas was abolished by the Constitutional Court on Nov. 13 last year. '€œI received threats months ago saying that I would be dragged down in August,'€ he said. '€œI have made enemies '€” you can see how the lawmakers in the House of Representatives have been treating me in public.'€

Before his arrest, Rudi was known for his outspoken, often controversial views on the oil and gas industry, including publicly supporting France-based Total E&P Indonesie in their bid to obtain a contract extension for the gas-rich Mahakam block in East Kalimantan rather than handing it to state-owned PT Pertamina.

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