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n yet another move viewed by many as an attempt to undermine the antigraft body, lawmakers have demanded the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) publish evidence in its investigation into the plundering of the budget for the e-ID project, in which several senior figures have allegedly been implicated.

Lawmakers from the House of Representatives Commission III on legal affairs, which supervises the anticorruption institution, have threatened to exercise their inquiry rights against the KPK because it has refused to provide records of interviews of a key witness, former lawmaker and Haruna Party politician Miryam S. Haryani.

Commission III lawmakers revealed the plan during a hearing with KPK leaders late on Tuesday evening. The majority of the 10 political factions at the House have expressed support for exercising the inquiry rights to force the KPK to hand over Miryam’s statements that reportedly reveal threats to force her to lie to KPK investigators.

Such attempts to influence Miryam were alleged by KPK investigator Novel Baswedan when he testified in a court hearing of the case. Quoting Miryam, Novel said at least five lawmakers from Commission III ordered her to deny that she had received dirty money from the e-ID project.

A week after the hearing, Novel was the victim of an acid attack by unidentified assailants near his house. He suffered serious injuries to his face and eyes.

The lawmakers Miryam reportedly named are Golkar politicians Bambang Soesatyo and Aziz Syamsuddin; Desmond Junaidi Mahesa of the Gerindra Party; Masinton Pasaribu of the ruling Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) and Hanura Party politician Syarifuddin Sudding.

Insisting that they were innocent, those lawmakers demanded KPK publish Miryam’s statements during the investigation for clarification.

“We understand that the records are part of evidence from an investigation. But we want the KPK to provide them here so we can see whether our names were actually mentioned [in Miryam’s statement],” Bambang said.

“Therefore, we in the Golkar faction agree to use our inquiry rights to make the KPK do so,” the chairman of Commission III added.

Others whose names were also mentioned in the statement quickly followed Bambang’s stance.

The PDI-P’s Masinton, for example, argued that exercising the inquiry rights to force the KPK to comply with lawmakers’ requests “was important to uphold a transparent legal process.”

Commission III is set to submit the plan to initiate the inquiry to House leaders as it has gained the support of a majority of political factions. According to Commission III deputy chairman Benny Kabur Harman, six out of 10 factions have supported the move.

The plan to initiate an investigation into the KPK will add to the list of investigations that lawmakers have attempted to conduct by exercising their inquiry rights. Previously, lawmakers also declared an inquiry into the Home Ministry for keeping incumbent Jakarta Governor Basuki “Ahok” Tjahaja Purnama in his gubernatorial post despite being on trial for blasphemy.

The inquiry plan was initiated by lawmakers from Gerindra, the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) and the National Mandate Party (PAN). Nothing appears to have come of the plan.

Indonesian Corruption Watch (ICW) coordinator Adnan Topan said he hoped that KPK leaders would not give in to lawmakers’ “political maneuvering.”

“The KPK must be brave in facing any efforts that could undermine its work,” he said. “Lawmakers have once again shown us that they care for nothing except matters that impact on their interests. We’ve never heard the House initiating anything to pursue investigations into cases of past rights abuses, for example. So why this case?.”