Bagus BT Saragih and Ridwan Max Sijabat, Jakarta – Leaders of the House of Representatives plan to summon senior officials from the country's top law enforcement bodies following the Corruption Eradication Commission's (KPK) move to question leaders of the House's budget committee over allegations of state budget misuse.
"House leaders are planning to summon the KPK, the National Police and the Attorney General's Office [AGO]. We need to inform them how the budgeting mechanism at the House works," House deputy speaker Pramono Anung of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) said on Thursday.
House leaders will also ask law enforcers not to interrogate any legislators about public policies they have made, Pramono added.
The decision was made after receiving an official request by the budget committee's leaders, who complained about the KPK's move to question them, which they said was "interfering" with the committee's budgeting mechanism, Pramono said.
On Tuesday, committee chairman Melchias Marcus Mekeng and his deputies, Tamsil Linrung, Mirwan Amir and Olly Dondokambey, were grilled by KPK investigators over a high-profile bribery case centering on a government project to build resettlement areas in Papua.
The committee had been suspected to have imposed so-called "commitment fees" on the company that won the Rp 73 billion (US$8.32 million) contract.
Following the questioning, Melchias, from the Golkar Party, said his committee had suspended deliberations on the 2012 State Budget until the law enforcement bodies promise not to question them over their budgeting authority.
Coordinating Economic Minister Hatta Rajasa reiterated that the state budget deliberations were an obligation for the government and lawmakers.
"I, therefore, call on my colleagues at the Finance Ministry and the National Development Planning Agency to ask the House to settle and resolve this issue," he said, while reminding that the state budget has to be ready to be passed by the end of next month.
Pramono and another House deputy speaker, Anis Matta, of the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), said they understood the committee's protest and could understand why it had threatened to suspend deliberating the budget.
Anis said the magnitude of the questioning of the legislators in public might lead to "a trial by the press", and could give the impression that lawmakers have abused their power.
"The KPK should hunt for budget brokers instead of legislators, whose task is to supervise state budget expenditures," added Pramono.
Pramono insisted that investigators had no authority to probe how the House had discussed the state budget, or the government projects that were part of the House's budgetary and supervisory rights, according to the 2009 Legislative Bodies Law.
"The KPK's investigators should never interrogate legislators over such rights ... If they do not understand the budgetary procedures, they should come to the House to learn from us," he said.
Later on Thursday, Melchias denied that the decision to suspend deliberations on the 2012 State Budget was to exact revenge on the KPK. "There is no reason for us to sulk," he told reporters.
KPK's chairman Busyro Muqoddas argued that the questioning of the four budget committee leaders had been aimed at "saving the committee from slanderous accusations" from a number of graft suspects involved in state projects that are currently under KPK investigation.
Graft suspects in these cases have mentioned the names of lawmakers as among those people who have handled, or accepted, amounts of corruption money. "We were actually providing legal room for them to offer official clarifications," Busyro said.