Camelia Pasandaran – Constitutional Court Chief Justice Mahfud M.D. confirmed on Wednesday that disgraced former Justice Arsyad Sanusi had been implicated in two court cases involving bribery and forgery.

"From all [election] cases at the Constitutional Court, internally we only found two violation cases, and both of them involve Arsyad," Mahfud said at a news conference at his office.

According to Mahfud, the first court case involves Arsyad and his daughter Nesyawati. Arsyad and his daughter allegedly accepted bribes from disgraced South Bengkulu regional head candidate Dirwan Mahmud in exchange for a favorable ruling in his 2008 run for South Bengkulu district head.

The second case centers around a fake court letter that awarded former legislative candidate Dewi Yasin Limpo the winning number of votes, wrongly securing Dewi a seat in the House of Representatives (DPR). The fake letter, dated August 14, was handed out at a General Elections Commission (KPU) meeting by former KPU member Andi Nurpati.

Recently, Constitutional Court Secretary General, Janedjri M. Ghaffar, told the House the letter was written in Arsyad's house on August 16.

Court staff Mashuri Hasan was reportedly the one who printed and registered the outgoing letter at the court. After scanning the signature of court clerk Zainal Abidin, Hasan placed the forged signature on the letter and submitted it to Arsyad's house.

However, on August 17, after consulting with Mahfud M.D, Mahfud told Hasan to draft a correct right letter based on the court ruling, and to have it delivered to Andi. The court staffs then took the letter to Andi, who was in JakTV, but Andi refused to receive it stating the letter not in the correct format. The letter was finally accepted by Andi's driver Aryo.

Although Andi was in possession of the correct letter, Andi brought the fake letter to the meeting and decided to grant a seat to Dewi amid a chorus of complains from the Election Supervisory Board (Bawaslu). The decision, however, was canceled in September after the court issued another letter explaining the real situation.

According to Mahfud, Arsyad threatened to reveal the ill-workings of the constitutional court twice.

"Arsyad in the past also threatened [to reveal the irregularities at the court]. In the case of Dirwan Mahmud, Arsyad revealed that Dirwan went to his house, which was orchestrated by Nesyawati," Mahfud said. "He cried in the justice meeting and threatened to destroy the court. I told him please do it."

Among Arsyad's browbeating remarks, he threatened to inform the public that Mahfud often met Bambang Widjojanto and Bibit Samad Rianto at his house. He also threatened to disclose that Mahfud was the one who asked him to tell Dewi Yasin Limpo not to report the incident to the police.

"Arsyad also said that the justice administration at the Constitutional Court is far worse than the Supreme Court," Mahfud said. "Indeed because the administration is good here, we found the fake letter case."

Mahfud said that the case left him disheartened because both court staff members involved, Mashuri and another staff named Mahfud, were actually good people.

"Good people here become his victims," Mahfud said. "They were good before being Arsyad's staff."

In addition to acknowledging Arsyad's involvement, Mahfud also confirmed that Andi Nurpati has been accused of embezzlement and forgery in the same case. "She was the one who showed the letter in the KPU meeting, as testified by a Bawaslu member," Mahfud said.

Mahfud said that he agreed the case should be handled through both political and legal tracks, but said the court would not get involved in the police investigation process.

"All who are involved have been punished morally," Mahfud said. "If the police want to forget the case, it is not our business. But if the House wants to really reveal the case, I'm ready to give additional explanations or material. But if they're lazy and want to politicize the case, please do."