Heru Andriyanto, Jakarta – More than a year since their legal nightmare started, two antigraft commissioners will likely still stand trial for what many believe is a fabricated corruption case.
The Supreme Court has rejected a case review request by prosecutors seeking to defend a decision to drop criminal charges against Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) deputy chairmen Chandra Hamzah and Bibit Samad Rianto.
Prosecutors were seeking a case review to overturn a Jakarta High Court ruling that their decision to drop the case against the pair was unlawful and that the two men should remain suspects.
"Our answer is 'no' for the case review request because it doesn't meet the formal requirements," Nurhadi, a Supreme Court spokesman, said on Friday. "The Supreme Court may try case reviews but not one originating from a pretrial motion."
A three-member panel presided over by Judge Imron Anwari made the ruling on Thursday.
Noted antigraft campaigner Todung Mulya Lubis reacted with outrage, describing it as favoring the graft convict who lodged the pretrial motion at the expense of the country's bigger interest in combating corruption.
"I am really saddened by the Supreme Court's decision, which ignores the core issue behind all this. The criminal case against the two has been fabricated," Todung, also a veteran lawyer, told the Jakarta Globe.
The KPK deputies were named suspects in September 2009 for allegedly abusing their power and extorting a graft suspect.
Their case evolved into a major scandal after the Constitutional Court played wiretapped phone conversations indicating that a suspected case broker, Anggodo Widjojo, and elements within the Attorney General's Office and the National Police had conspired to fabricate the case.
Amid mounting public pressure and a presidential statement saying the case should be halted, the South Jakarta Prosecutor's Office dropped the criminal charges against Chandra and Bibit late last year, arguing that it would be morally harmful to try the deputies.
But Anggodo lodged a pretrial motion demanding that both deputies face trial and won his case at both the district and high court.
Anggodo, then a graft suspect, has since been sentenced to four years in jail for, ironically, attempting to bribe Bibit and Chandra with Rp 5.1 billion ($566,000) in exchange for halting a criminal investigation into his brother, businessman Anggoro Widjojo, who is now at large.
Todung said the Supreme Court decision "will further cripple the KPK. The agency will become terrified when handling cases."
Criminal law expert Edi Hiariej said the deputies could still escape prosecution if the attorney general was willing to use his exclusive right to terminate a criminal case in the public interest, a legal principle adopted from the Dutch system known as "deponering."
"Since the beginning of the case, I have been calling for deponering to settle the legal debate once and for all," said Edi, from Gadjah Mada University. "But the AGO left it to district prosecutors to issue the termination, which was highly vulnerable to legal challenges."
Taufik Basari, the lawyer for the two KPK deputies, said they were prepared to defend themselves in the courtroom. "If we must go to court, we will go. There's nothing to be afraid of," he said.
Bibit and Chandra do not have to worry about losing their jobs because the Constitutional Court ruled in November that KPK leaders in a criminal case, as with any other state officials, cannot be dismissed until there is a final and binding guilty verdict.