Ezra Sihite – Efforts to oust Vice President Boediono have hit another snag, with only two lawmakers on a key House of Representatives committee urging the legislature to undertake a maneuver that would pave the way for an impeachment hearing.
Hendrawan Supratikno, a legislator with the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), on Wednesday said that only two members of the committee monitoring the investigation into the Bank Century bailout supported the House exercising its right to express an opinion (HMP), which would enable the then-governor of Bank Indonesia to face a hearing over the bank's Rp 6.7 trillion ($700 million) bailout in 2008.
Bambang Soesatyo of the Golkar Party and Akbar Faisal of the People's Conscience Party (Hanura) backed the HMP option, "but other members of the team want to give the KPK [Corruption Eradication Commission] the chance to develop its investigation after receiving instruction from their parties," Hendrawan said.
The meeting, however, was not attended by representatives from the Democratic Party. Hendrawan said that the team will bring the decision to a plenary meeting on the Bank Century case next month.
Aside from the decision not to drop the HMP option, the team is also seeking to extend the working period of the monitoring team for the Bank Century case.
The joint secretariat of the ruling coalition parties on Tuesday night agreed that the Bank Century case will be settled through the legal process, as opposed to the political process. Therefore, the ruling coalition opted to drop the HMP option.
"The joint secretariat is pushing for the legal process of the special committee's report so that in the future it will be legally processed and not politically processed," said National Mandate Party (PAN) House chairman Tjatur Sapto Edy.
Tjatur said the HMP option was considered unstrategic because the government was coming toward the end of its term. e added that the HMP process also tended to be subjective because it would be based on results of House votes.
"It would be subjective if we used the political process because it would depend on the voting," he said.