Jakarta – A wealthy Indonesian businessman once implicated in a bank scandal that led to the downfall of former president B.J. Habibie jumped to his death from a hotel window yesterday.

Mr Marimutu Manimaren, 46, a commissioner of the troubled Indonesian conglomerate Texmaco, leapt from the 56th floor of Aston Hotel in downtown Jakarta, said police Major Kusdiantoro.

The death follows that of Hyundai executive Chung Mong Hun who was found dead on Monday morning after falling from his high-rise South Korean office building in an apparent suicide. Mr Chung, chairman of Hyundai Asan Corp, was under investigation for illicit payments of millions of dollars to communist North Korea.

Mr Manimaren was a former deputy treasurer of ex-dictator Suharto's Golkar party, Indonesia's second-largest political party.

The party's chairman, Mr Akbar Tanjung, told journalists that he regretted the death of Mr Manimaren. He said he had last met Mr Manimaren and his elder brother Marimutu Sinivasan, the Texmaco president, two weeks earlier when they told him "of the problems faced by their company".

Police said Mr Manimaren checked into Aston Hotel on Monday evening after leaving instructions with his driver, Udin, to pick him up at 7am yesterday.

The case has been classified a suicide because there was no sign of a struggle in his room, said Colonel Zainuri Lubis. But nothing has been ruled out yet.

South Jakarta's chief of detectives Commander Merdisyam said a thorough investigation into the businessman's death had been ordered. "There is the possibility that it was a suicide, but Manimaren was a business and political figure so we have to look into all possibilities," he said.

Texmaco is threatened with takeover by the Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency if it cannot repay the US$29-million letter of credit facility it drew from a state bank and 29 trillion rupiah it owes the government.

Mr Manimaren was one of several Golkar officials suspected of involvement in the 1999 "Baligate" scandal, in which the equivalent of US$80 million was illegally transferred from the insolvent Bank Bali to a company closely linked to Golkar. The funds were allegedly used to finance that year's unsuccessful election campaign by Mr Habibie, Suharto's hand-picked successor.

Police officers questioned Mr Manimaren over his alleged role in the scandal at the time, but did not charge him.