Bandung – Dozens of graft convicts detained in different cities across the country have been gradually transferred to Sukamiskin Penitentiary in Bandung, West Java, since Friday night.

They were initially detained in Jakarta, Central Java, Yogyakarta, Banten and North Sulawesi. Of the total detainees, 21 prisoners from Jakarta arrived on Friday night.

"About 75 convicts – comprising 54 convicts from Semarang, nine from Yogyakarta, 21 from Banten and one from Manado – will arrive on Saturday," Law and Human Rights Ministry West Java office head I Wayan K. Dusak said Friday as quoted by tempo.co.

Sukamiskin Penitentiary, where Indonesia's founding father and first president Sukarno was detained during the struggle for independence, has 546 cells – excluding the cell in which Sukarno was detained, which remains empty. As many as 130 prisoners of the total 327 prisoners currently detained in the prison are graft convicts.

Deputy Law and Human Rights Minister Denny Indrayana said the ministry aimed to turn Sukamiskin into a prison for graft convicts. "If there are still other convicts in Sukamiskin it is because other prisons are overcrowded," he said.

According to Denny, 1,800 graft convicts are currently being detained in different prisons across the country. The ministry plans to transfer all male graft convicts, who were politicians, councilors or officials sentenced to a minimum of five years in prison, to Sukamiskin. (swd)