Jakarta – After three years of delays, the Attorney General's Office (AGO) announced Tuesday it will form two special teams to investigate corruption cases involving Bank Indonesia Liquidity Support (BLBI) funds debtors.
Hendarman Supandji, the newly appointed attorney general, says there will be an execution team and an examination team, comprising a total of 35 attorneys selected from the 80 names submitted.
"These 35 will be divided into two teams," said the secretary to the junior attorney general for special crimes, Kemas Yahya Rahman.
"The execution team will trace the assets of the BLBI debtors. It will consist of attorneys with intelligence backgrounds who will be supervised by two senior attorneys.
"The examination team will closely inspect BLBI cases. These teams, of course, will be under the attorney general's supervision," Kemas said.
He said the AGO would determine which of the BLBI cases had strong evidence of causing big losses to the state.
The BLBI program was established by the government and managed by the now defunct Indonesian Bank Restructuring Agency (IBRA) to bail out banks suffering after the 1997-1998 Asian monetary crisis.
However, many bankers abused the program and stole money channeled from the government.
The IBRA was only able to recover about 20 percent of the Rp 650 trillion (US$73.9 billion) in liquidity support.
Kemas said BLBI cases that involved corruption would be investigated, but added that civil cases would be handed over to the Finance Ministry.
He said the AGO would recheck the release and discharge policy, which was enacted by former president Megawati Soekarnoputri, to ensure that debtors had repaid their obligations.
"The AGO will make an all-out effort to resolve these cases in 2007. Hopefully, the two teams will be established before July 22."
Hendarman has made coordination visits to the Supreme Audit Agency, the Development and Finance Controller, the Finance Ministry and the Corruption Eradication Commission in order to resolve the BLBI case.
He promised to reopen the case prior to his appointment as attorney general at the beginning of May this year.
According to the Finance Ministry, the eight outstanding BLBI debtors are: Ulung Bursah (Bank Lautan Berlian), Atang Latief (Bank Indonesia Raya), Omar Putirai and Lidia Muchtar (Bank Tamara), Marimutu Sinivisan (Bank Putra Multi Karsa), Agus Anwar (Bank Pelita and Bank Istimarat), and James Januardi and Adisaputra Januardi (Bank Namura Internusa).