Jakarta – Liem Sioe Liong, also known as Sudono Salim, once the country's wealthiest person who amassed vast wealth from his close connection with former New Order strongman Soeharto, passed away on Sunday evening from age-related illnesses in Singapore. He was 96.
Liem is survived by his wife Lie Las Nio and his four children Albert, Andre, Anthoni and Mira. "He passed away due to age-related illnesses," said former colleague, businessman Sofjan Wanandi, on Sunday.
Liem, who died in Raffles Hospital at around 3 p.m. local time, spent his retirement in a private residence adjacent to Changi International Airport in Singapore.
He decided to relocate to Singapore in 1998 in the wake of the anti-Chinese riots that swept the capital following the resignation of his patron Soeharto on May 21.
His close ties with Soeharto and the accusation that he benefitted immensely from the relationship had made him the target of anti-Chinese mobs during the rioting. His home on Jl. Gunung Sahari, Central Jakarta, was ransacked.
The patron-client relationship between Liem and Soeharto dated back to the early 1950s.
Born in Fujian, China on Sept. 10, 1915, the impoverished Liem left his hometown for Indonesia when he was only 22. In the 1950s, he became a logistics supplier for the Indonesian Military's Diponogoro Division in Central Java, during which he forged ties with Soeharto, who was then only a colonel. He won projects for the military command when Soeharto was in charge of the division in the 1960s.
He set up Central Bank Asia (later BCA) in 1957, which thanks to easy access to credit from the New Order government grew to become one of the country's biggest banks.
When Soeharto came to power in 1965, Liem's fortunes took off. Liem's PT Mega was one of only two companies licensed to import cloves. In 1969 he was granted a license to trade in flour by the State Logistics Agency (Bulog). In the early 1970s, he set up Bogasari Flour Mills which then monopolized the import, milling and distribution of flour in the country. By 1991, Bogasari was the world's largest commercial buyer of wheat.
In 1975, he opened a cement plant, Indocement Tunggal Prakarsa, and by the mid-1980s the cement-producing complex in West Java was said to be the biggest in the world. The company is now controlled by German cement maker HeidelbergCement.
In the 1980s, he acquired sole agency for the assembly and distribution of Suzuki, Volvo, Nissan and Mazda cars, Hino trucks and Suzuki motorcycles.
Following Soeharto's downfall, the Liem family business ran into trouble with the Reform era government opening an investigation into the tycoon's alleged swindling of Bank Indonesia Liquidity Assistance (BLBI) funds.
University of Indonesia political analyst Fachry Ali said that Liem's passing would mean little to the country's business community. (tas)