T

he Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) is lobbying the Attorney General'€™s Office (AGO) to withdraw the dossiers of an assault case involving its senior investigator Novel Baswedan in a last-ditch attempt to stop the case from going to trial.

KPK deputy chairman Saut Situmorang confirmed the move on Monday, saying that the antigraft body was maintaining dialogue with relevant parties to help coax Attorney General M. Prasetyo to meet calls to drop Novel'€™s case.

'€œWe are currently maintaining communication with forces outside of the KPK,'€ Saut told The Jakarta Post on Monday.

Saut refused to disclose details of the KPK'€™s lobbying efforts aimed at preventing the Bengkulu District Court from commencing the case'€™s trial.

The court has yet to set a start date for the trial but the KPK will lose any of hope getting the case dropped after the court announces a date for Novel'€™s first hearing.

Prasetyo could not be reached for comment as of Monday afternoon.

Novel stands accused of shooting a robbery suspect during his tenure as Bengkulu Police chief detective in 2004. The police reopened an investigation into the case in 2012, after the KPK had named then-National Police Traffic Corps (Korlantas) chief Insp. Gen. Djoko Susilo a graft suspect.

Then president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono requested the police drop the investigation into Novel'€™s case to avoid worsening a standoff between the police and the KPK, but the police reopened the case after the KPK named Comr. Gen. Budi Gunawan a bribery suspect in January last year.

Despite alleged irregularities in their handling of Novel'€™s case, the National Police completed an investigation late last year into Novel and sent his dossiers to the Bengkulu Prosecutor'€™s Office, which is under the supervision of the AGO.

The prosecutor'€™s office recently completed its indictment against Novel in the case and sent the indictment to be tried at the Bengkulu District Court despite condemnation from legal experts who acknowledged Novel'€™s case was married with irregularities.

Novel'€™s legal team from the Indonesian Legal Aid Institute Foundation (YLBHI) met with KPK commissioners on Monday to urge them to ask the AGO to halt Novel'€™s trial.

After Monday'€™s meeting, Novel'€™s lawyer, Lelyana Santosa, said that KPK leaders had their thrown support behind the team'€™s efforts to withdraw the indictment.

'€œWe have to use the remaining time because the AGO still has the authority to withdraw the indictment [before the court sets a date for Novel'€™s trial],'€ Lelyana told reporters at KPK headquarters on Monday.

'€œThe KPK said that it will try its best, whatever it takes, to halt the trial,'€ the lawyer went on.

Another one of Novel'€™s lawyers, Julius Ibrani, said that Prasetyo should not worry about withdrawing Novel'€™s indictment because such a mechanism was regulated under Article 144 of the Criminal Law Procedures Code (KUHAP).

'€œThe article says that prosecutors can make a change to an indictment before the court sets a trial date, whether it is to improve the quality of the indictment or to stop the prosecution'€™,'€ Julius said.

Saor Siagian, another member of Novel'€™s legal team, said that Novel'€™s prosecution had affected the performance of the KPK.