Jakarta – Luthfi Hasan Ishaaq, the former chairman of the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) who arrested by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) for alleged graft, has been slapped with money laundering charges, the agency's spokesman said.

The politician, deemed by his colleagues within the Islamic party as an ustadj or religious teacher, has been charged with violating articles 3, 4 and 5 of the 2010 Money Laundering Law, KPK spokesman Johan Budi told reporters on Tuesday.

"KPK investigators reached this conclusion based on the development of the case so far. As of now, the commission is still investigating Luthfi's assets in a process we call asset tracing," he said.

The KPK questioned Luthfi on Tuesday over his role in a corruption case pertaining to the beef import policy at the Agriculture Ministry, which is led by Suswono, a PKS politician. Luthfi arrived at the KPK building at approximately 10 a.m. and left the building at around 4 p.m.

Luthfi is accused of using his influence as PKS leader to encourage the ministry to award a beef-import license to a particular private company. He was arrested after his reportedly close aide, Ahmad Fathanah, was caught red-handed accepting a bribe of Rp 1 billion (US$102,740) from Juard Effendy and Arya Abdi Effendi from meat importer PT Indoguna Utama.

Ahmad allegedly planned to pass on the bribe money to Luthfi.

The KPK has also charged Ahmad with money laundering. The investigators have seized four cars worth Rp. 4.3 billion from Ahmad as evidence of his alleged money laundering practices. The cars were confiscated from Ahmad's residence in Citayem, Depok, West Java. One car, a Toyota Land Cruiser Prado was confiscated during Ahmad's arrest at the Le Meridien Hotel on the evening of Jan. 29.

Yenti Ganarsih, a money laundering expert from Trisakti University, said the new charges against Luthfi could be used by the KPK to name more suspects in the case.

"The people who accepted the money or helped Luthfi to hide his allegedly dirty money are definitely involved in this scandal," she said. "The KPK investigators can conclude that Luthfi is involved in money laundering if the total value of his property is greater than the sum of his financial wealth."

Novel Baswedan, an investigator who has worked with the KPK for seven years, said investigating a money laundering case was no easy task. "The most difficult task in such an investigation is to find the evidence. In a money laundering case, suspects always hide their ill-gotten wealth very carefully," he said.

The KPK has charged a number of graft suspects with money laundering. One of them is former National Traffic Police Corps (Korlantas) chief Insp. Gen. Djoko Susilo, who will soon stand trial for his role in the corruption case surrounding the procurement by the National Police of driving simulators.

Djoko was found to have stashed his massive wealth in purchasing a number of houses, most of which are registered to his three wives. (ogi)