An indictment read out by Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) prosecutors against businessman Andi Agustinus aka Andi Narogong, the defendant in a graft case surrounding the e-ID procurement project, in a hearing on Monday, reasserted the alleged role of House of Representatives Speaker and Golkar Party chairman Setya Novanto in the case.

During the hearing, prosecutors mentioned several meetings, which they said had involved Setya, who was considered a key figure in the e-ID project budgeting process at the House.

It was stated in the indictment that what Setya had said in his meeting with Andi and Irman, a former Home Ministry official who has been convicted in the case, removed the ministry’s official’s doubts about the House speaker’s promises to ease the process. The meeting took place several days after their first meeting in February 2010.

The prosecutors later stated in their indictment that in the meeting, Setya told Irman that he was still coordinating the preparation of funding for the e-ID project.

“The defendant [Andi], as someone who represented Setya, later made a deal with Nazaruddin, who represented [then Democratic Party faction chairman] Anas Urbaningrum on how to spend the e-ID funds,” said KPK prosecutor Irene Putri, referring to Muhammad Nazaruddin, the then Democratic Party treasurer.

She further said that in their meeting, Andi and Nazaruddin agreed to spend only 51 percent of the total Rp 5.9 trillion (US$441.98 million) on the project.

Monday’s hearing at the Jakarta Corruption Court was Andi’s first hearing. The KPK have named him a suspect in the graft case for his alleged role in influencing both the budgeting process of the e-ID project at the House and the tender process at the Home Ministry.

In the hearing, prosecutors also claimed that in a meeting in 2011, Andi had introduced two businessmen, namely Sandhipala Arthapura president director Paulus Tannos and STMicroelectronics country manager Vincent Cousin, to Setya in order to get the latter’s approval to take on the e-ID project. Setya straightaway gave his approval to Paulus and Vincent at the meeting.

The KPK prosecutors’ indictment was in contrast to a lack of any mention of Setya’s role when the Jakarta Corruption Court’s judge panel read out its verdict statement at the trial of Irman and his fellow official, Sugiharto, in July. The judges sentenced Irman to seven years behind bars, while Sugiharto was handed a five-year prison sentence.

At Irman and Sugiharto’s trial, Setya’s name had been mentioned in both the indictments and sentence demand.

Handing down their guilty verdict for both officials, the judges mentioned only three lawmakers as having received benefits from the e-ID project, namely Hanura Party politician Miryam S. Haryani and two Golkar politicians, Markus Nari and Ade Komarudin.

The judges failed to mention any other lawmakers’ names believed to have been implicated in the case, including Setya who has been named a suspect in the case.

Andi’s first hearing was held in the wake of the death of businessman Johannes Marliem, who was believed to possess key evidence regarding the alleged involvement of politicians in the high-profile case, which allegedly caused Rp 2.3 trillion (US$172.3 million) in state losses.

Johannes, was found dead inside his home in Los Angeles, in the United States, on Thursday. The cause of his death remains undisclosed by local authorities.

Questions have been raised about the circumstances of the death. Mainstream media in the US largely ignored the issue, until a report released by Associated Press on Sunday confirmed Johannes’ death.

The mystery surrounding the death was heightened by a report from a neighbor, as quoted in the Los Angeles Times, of a break-in at the house a week prior to Johannes’ death.

Johannes is the third witness in the case to have died since the corruption in the project allegedly began in 2009. The two other witnesses were Democratic Party politician Ignatius Mulyono, who died of a heart attack in Jakarta in 2015, and former Golkar lawmaker Mustokoweni, who died in Semarang, Central Java, in 2010.

The e-ID graft case has not only been marred by the deaths of key witnesses. There has also been allegations of intimidation and violence against witnesses, as well as a senior KPK investigator, Novel Baswedan.

Despite months of investigation, the Jakarta Police have so far been unable to apprehend the perpetrators of an acid attack on Novel, amid suspicions voiced by the senior investigator that the involvement of a police general in the case was the cause of the police’s sluggishness approach to solving the case. (kuk)

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