Profile Of Karen Agustiawan, Former President Director Of Pertamina Who Was Prevented Overseas By The KPK

Former President Director of PT Pertamina (Persero) Karen Agustiawan. (Photo: ANTARA)

JAKARTA - The Directorate General (Ditjen) of Immigration at the Ministry of Law and Human Rights (Kemenkumham) has prevented former President Director (Director) of PT Pertamina (Persero) Karen Agustiawan from going abroad.

Prevention is carried out at the request of the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK).

"(Prevented from leaving the country, ed) on behalf of Karen A," said Achmad Nur Saleh, Sub-Coordinator of Public Relations at the Immigration Ministry of the Ministry of Law and Human Rights (Kemenkumham), in a written statement, Wednesday, July 13.

In March 2020, Karen was just released after being detained for a long time in the AGO Detention Center.

Prior to being detained at the AGO, Karen was the first woman to hold the position of President Director (Director) of PT Pertamina (Persero) for the 2009-2014 period.

The woman who was born in Bandung on October 19, 1958 is a graduate of the Faculty of Engineering Physics at the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB) class of 1978.

After graduating from ITB, Karen started her career at Mobil Oil Indonesia from 1984 to 1996 as a systems analyst and programmer for the development of reserve calculations, and project leader in the exploration computing department.

In 2002-2006, Karen joined Halliburton Indonesia.

Halliburton Company is an American multinational company that is one of the largest oilfield service providers in the world.

From there she started her career as the first Indonesian woman to be recruited as a commercial manager at the company.

Her career at Pertamina began in 2006 when she was appointed as Expert Staff to the President Director for Pertamina's Upstream Business in 2006. From the Expert Staff, Karen was later appointed as Director of Pertamina Hulu.

When Sofyan Djalil served as Minister of SOEs in 2009, Karen was appointed President Director of Pertamina to replace Ari Soemarno, the older brother of former SOE Minister Rini Soemarno.

During her tenure as President Director of this state-owned oil and gas company, Karen was included in the ranks of Asia's 50 Power Businesswomen issued by Forbes in 2011.

During his tenure, Pertamina made many acquisitions of oil and gas blocks abroad such as Iraq and Algeria.

In 2014 Karen resigned from her first person position at Pertamina, and in 2019 she was charged with involvement in the corruption case of Australia's Basker Manta Gummy (BMG) oil drilling investment in 2009 which cost the state Rp568 billion.

Karen was sentenced to 8 years in prison and a fine of Rp. 1 billion, subsidiary to 4 months in prison.

After being detained since 2019, on March 9, 2020 in an appeal decision, the Supreme Court (MA) handed down a acquittal to Karen on the grounds that what Karen did was a business risk.