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KPK urged to be resolute in solving IndonesiaLeaks report case
Jakarta Post - October 15, 2018
The Legal Aid Institute for the Press (LBH Pers), civil society group Auriga Nusantara and the Alliance of Independence Journalists (AJI) – among the parties behind IndonesiaLeaks – asked the KPK to not be afraid of any possible police intimidation.
LBH Pers said the KPK had appeared to move backwards when it denied that CCTV footage allegedly showing two police officers – who were assigned as KPK investigators at the time – ripping out several pages of a book detailing transactions between a meat importer and National Police chief Tito Karnavian was incriminating.
IndonesiaLeaks cited in its report that the CCTV footage in question, filmed in April 2017, allegedly showed that the two former KPK investigators were Adj. Sr. Comr. Roland Ronaly and Comr. Harun.
"KPK chairman Agus Rahardjo previously admitted to IndonesiaLeaks that they had seen the CCTV footage, and handed over the officers to the police after a [KPK internal investigation] found that they were guilty," LBH Pers executive director Nawawi Bahrudin said.
Nawawi was referring to Agus' statement made during an interview with IndonesiaLeaks' members two months ago.
But soon after IndonesiaLeaks published its report, Agus told the media that the accusation of the book being destroyed was not seen in the footage.
KPK spokesman Febri Diansyah has said the KPK's internal investigation was stopped when Roland and Harun returned to the police in late 2017, after a request from the National Police.
"We want the KPK chairman to be consistent both in his statement and actions on the alleged cases related to tampering with the investigation," Nawawi said.
Meanwhile, the AJI suspected that the KPK might be afraid of dealing with the police given its checkered history when investigating police officers.
The National Police are known to have tried to weaken the KPK several times, including when the police besieged the KPK's office in 2012 in an attempt to arrest KPK lead investigator Novel Baswedan, after the KPK declared police general Djoko Susilo a graft suspect.
"During our [seven-month] investigation, IndonesiaLeaks members often received threats, but we are not afraid. As long as it is in the public interest, we will continue the investigation," AJI chairman Abdul Manan said, calling on the KPK to follow its lead.
Mardiyah Chamim, the executive director of Tempo Institute, which participated in the IndonesiaLeaks investigation, confirmed that investigators had been intimidated.
"Our teams were followed and asked about the motives behind the investigation [in an intimidating manner]," Mardiyah said, refusing to detail the alleged incidents.
The IndonesiaLeaks report also cited that the book was among the pieces of evidence confiscated in the bribery case involving meat importer Basuki Hariman and former Constitutional Court justice Patrialis Akbar, both of whom were sentenced in September 2017.
From a KPK report in March last year, IndonesiaLeaks found that a witness, Kumala Dewi Sumartono, Basuki's finance staffer at CV Sumber Laut Perkasa, told investigators that some of the money recorded in the financial records book was wired to Tito between January and July 2016.
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