Markus Junianto Sihaloho, Jakarta – Officials must investigate all the alleged corporate tax cheats linked to rogue tax official Gayus Tambunan and not focus only on those owned by the Golkar chairman, a lawmaker says.
Gayus, who amassed more than Rp 100 billion ($11.2 million) in bank accounts, gold and foreign currency, has said most of it came from bribes from 140 companies, including miners Kaltim Prima Coal, Arutmin and Bumi Resources.
Those three are owned by the family of Golkar chairman Aburizal Bakrie and have been embroiled in a spat with the tax office over unpaid taxes. Gayus claims to have received a total of $3 million from them.
However, police have investigated only four companies, identified only as SAT, DAS, E and I. No charges have been pressed against any of these or the Bakrie companies. Gayus is on trial for money-laundering and corruption.
On Sunday, however, Golkar's Bambang Soesatyo, who serves on the House of Representatives' Commission III overseeing legal affairs, said there were indications that Gayus had been ordered to highlight only the Bakrie companies.
Bambang said he was collecting information about legal violations allegedly committed by some of the companies involved that were backed by other politicians, which he said had not been investigated.
However, he declined to name the companies or officials, saying only that the allegations against the Bakrie miners were part of a wider pattern to target Golkar.
"We all know Gayus was linked to more than 140 companies, so why have the police not probed all the links?" Bambang said. "We urge the National Police and the Attorney General's Office to investigate the cases, reveal what went on and prosecute all those involved."
Meanwhile, Bonyamin Saiman, an activist from the Indonesian Anti-Corruption Society (MAKI), accused the police and AGO of dragging their feet on investigations into the companies linked to Gayus.
The former tax official worked on the tax returns of at least 149 companies during his time with the office, according to the Finance Ministry's Directorate General of Taxation.
Besides the Bakrie companies, some of the other major ones include oil major Chevron Oil Products Indonesia, offshore contractor Dowell Anadrill Schlumberger, automaker Ford Indonesia, and telecommunications operator Excelcomindo Pratama.
Gayus has indicated he helped only 44 of those companies evade taxes. "Despite what Gayus has claimed, the police and AGO must follow up on all the links," Bonyamin said. "It's a big scandal and must be investigated thoroughly."
He added that MAKI would file a pretrial motion for an investigation into the cases if Gayus's trial focused only on the Bakrie companies.
AGO spokesman Babul Khoir Harahap said the office intended to "reveal the scandal thoroughly," but he added it could not take any steps without police investigators first releasing the results of their own investigation.
"We still haven't received any of the investigation files from the police dealing with the case," he said.
Meanwhile, Arbi Sanit, a political analyst from the University of Indonesia, said the high prevalence of major scandals erupting across the country were a "clear reflection of leadership weaknesses."
Weak leadership, he said, would always result in wrong policies and nurture a climate of corruption. "We must now start fixing all of this," Arbi said. "We should not let any more scandals break open without coming up with a fair and proper resolution."