One of the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) biggest achievements in 2022 was probably the revelation of the cooking oil scandal. However, what started as a shock to the nation, turned out to be less of a surprise in court. The public no longer paid much attention to the trial. The indictments for the defendants were read out in the last week of August 2022, and in just four months, towards the end of December 2022, the demands for the defendants were read out. In January 2023, the defendants were declared guilty but not on the main indictment. Thus, the decisions given are far from what was expected by the AGO. On the appeal stage, the decision remains the same then the AGO decided to file for a cassation to the Supreme Court. Within the last two weeks, the Supreme Court provided heavier punishments for the convicts.

Grace Dewi Riady, familiarly known as Grace Tahir, daughter of Mayapada’s patron, Dato Sri Tahir, and the leader of Mayapada Hospital, was examined as one of the witnesses in the case of alleged money laundering which ensnared a former Echelon III official at the Ministry of Finance, Rafael Alun Trisambodo. The news has attracted public attention. Of course, many parties used this opportunity to sneer at this conglomerate, although it is not known for certain whether Grace is directly related to Rafael.

In mid last year, Fadel Muhammad (a senator from Gorontalo who is also a businessman) was removed from his position as deputy chairman of the People’s Consultative Assembly (MPR)–the highest legislative body in Indonesia. The reason for his removal, interestingly, was a vote of no-confidence (mosi tidak percaya) that was filed by nearly 100 parties. The MPR does not recognize a no-confidence mechanism. After a month had passed, Fadel fought back and filed a lawsuit to the Central Jakarta District Court, accusing the parties of carrying out unlawful acts and asking for compensation of more than Rp200 billion. Earlier this year, Fadel lost his case in Central Jakarta, but at the same time, Fadel filed a different lawsuit to the Jakarta State Administrative Court (PTUN Jakarta). Recently, we learned that the PTUN decided in favor of Fadel.

Eight years ago, we witnessed an open dispute between senior announcer Dalton Ichiro Tanonaka, who is also the director of PT Melia Media International (PT MMI), and PT Vivaces Prabu Investments. Dalton allegedly committed fraud and embedded investment funds amounting to US$500,000. In a series of trials up to the Supreme Court, Dalton was defeated. Since then, the name of this company has rarely been heard in the public, until recently. In the last two weeks, there have been two related lawsuits filed against the same party namely PT Nonghyup Korindo Sekuritas Indonesia (previously PT Woori Korindo Securities Indonesia), one of the plaintiffs is Vivaces Investments while the other lawsuit is filed by a familiar name, Parvathi Prem Harjani, son of Harjani Prem Ramchand or Prem Harjani Ramchand otherwise known as Prem Harjani, owner of Vivaces Investments.

With time running out, the Satgas consistently continues to make its ongoing efforts to ensure that the State’s collection rights can be fulfilled. This is done through several actions including confiscating collateral assets and other assets owned by obligors/debtors who have received BLBI funding facilities and have not completed their obligations properly. Last week, the Satgas seized the collateral assets of three obligors. On top of that, the Satgas is also working on billing and within one week, two billing summons were published.

Over two months ago, the Minister of State-Owned Enterprises (BUMN), Erick Thohir, visited the Attorney General’s Office (AGP) to report a number of cases of alleged corruption in a number of State-owned companies, including the case that allegedly occurred at PT Graha Telkom Sigma (PT GTS, subsidiary of PT Sigma Cipta Caraka – Sigma). Examination of witnesses was sped up immediately after the report was received. This week, the AGO announced that they had named six suspects in the case. We noted that a few days after the report was submitted, the Central Jakarta District Court registered a lawsuit filed against Erick Thohir and several other parties, the plaintiff was one of the witnesses examined by the AGO and was also a former Sigma executive. The court proceedings are ongoing.

It has been a while since the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) announced their new investigation into the case of alleged corruption in PT Amarta Karya (Persero), a State-owned construction company. This week, the KPK finally named two suspects. Meanwhile, Amarta’s vendors and business partners have been trying to force the company to restructure its debts through the PKPU process. By October 2022, there were three new PKPU lawsuits filed against the company, one of which was granted by the Panel of Judges. The company struggled to settle the dispute with a peace agreement and had until June 2023 to submit their peace proposal.

An advocate, Yasin Djamaluddin, filed a petition for Judicial Review of Law No. 16/2004 concerning the Prosecutors’ Office to the Constitutional Court. Yasin Djamaluddin asked for the prosecutors’ authority on investigation and inquisition of corruption cases to be removed. This lawsuit is interesting, not only because it was filed when the prosecutors’ offices under the lead of the Attorney General’s Office (AGO) was in their prime and exposed various allegations of major corruption cases, but also because Yasin acted as legal counsel for several graft suspects.

Back in September 2022, the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) conducted a Sting Operation which revealed a confusing and prolonged dispute within KSP Intidana. Two of the suspects named afterwards were part of Intidana, by then we wonder why they insisted on seeking Intidana bankruptcy. Justice Sudrajad Dimyati was named suspect and managed to make history as the first Justice ensnared by the KPK. Soon after, the Supreme Court had annulled the disputed decision and reinstated Intidana to its pre-bankruptcy status. This decision is interesting because it was read just one week after the KPK confirmed that they had named another Supreme Court Justice as a suspect in this case, making him the second Justice to be named a graft suspect. The suspect is Justice Gazalba Saleh. This week, KPK announced that they had named two new suspects in the case, meanwhile, the prosecutors demanded Sudrajad to be punished to 13 years in prison.

The ‘clean-up’ efforts carried out within State-Owned Enterprises (BUMN) continue to be carried out by borrowing the authority of the Attorney General’s Office (AGO). After successfully exposing mega-corruption cases involving several BUMN and/or its subsidiaries, now the AGO is starting to expose cases that allegedly occurred in the management of pension funds. This week, the AGO announced allegations of corruption in the management of the Pension Fund of Port and Dredging Company (DP4, Dapen Pelindo) at PT Pelabuhan Indonesia (Persero) and announced six suspects in this case.