P

rosecutors have demanded four-year sentences for the four former Bank Indonesia deputy governors on trial for the illegal disbursement of a Rp 100 billion fund.

The four men are charged with disbursing the US$9.92 million fund from BI's Indonesian Banking Development Foundation (YPPI) in 2003.

On Friday, prosecutors alleged there was tight cooperation between the four defendants and Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) chief Anwar Nasution and former BI deputy governor R. Maulana Ibrahim.

The defendants are Maman Husen Soemantri, Bun Bunan E.J. Hutapea, Aslim Tadjuddin and Aulia Pohan, the father-in-law of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's first son.

"We demand the court find the defendants legally and con-vincingly guilty of joint corruption and sentence them to four years' imprisonment each," prosecutor Rudi Margono told the Corruption Court.

The prosecutors also demanded the defendants pay Rp 300 million in fines or serve an additional six months in jail should they fail to do so.

"After meeting with the House of Representatives' Commission IX, the defendants, together with Anwar and Maulana, knew they would need money to settle the BI Liquidity Support *BLBI* cases and fast-track the amendment of the BI law," said prosecutor I Ketut Sumedana.

He added they also knew about requests from five former senior BI officials - Hendro Budianto, Heru Soepraptomo, Iwan R. Prawiranata, Paul Sutopo and former BI governor Sudradjad Djiwandono - for help in financing their legal expenses. The five were implicated in the BLBI graft cases.

"The defendants, together with Anwar and Maulana, then arranged at the bank's board of governors' meeting to use Rp 100 billion of BI's YPPI fund," Ketut said.

Of that amount, Rp 68.5 billion was disbursed to five former senior BI officials by the bank's deputy legal division head, Oey Hoey Tiong, while Rp 31.5 billion was disbursed by governor bureau head Rusli Simanjuntak to Commission IX members Anthony Zeidra Abidin and Hamka Yandhu.

Ketut said the defendants had wasted state money and enriched other people by using the YPPI money, despite being aware that a legal aid fund had been set aside in the BI legal division's budget.

He added there was no record on the use of the money, in either BI or YPPI records.

"The defendants misused their authority as senior officials to enrich other people," Ketut said.

The court previously convicted former BI governor Burhanuddin Abdullah in the case and sentenced him to five years' imprisonment, while Oey Hoey Tiong and Rusli Simanjuntak were sentenced to four years each.

Former legislators Hamka and Anthony were given three and four-and-a-half years respectively.