4 Garuda Indonesia Officials Examined By The Attorney General's Office For Corruption In Airplane Rentals

Garuda Indonesia aircraft. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)

JAKARTA - Investigators of the Deputy Attorney General for Special Crimes at the Attorney General's Office have again examined a number of witnesses related to the alleged corruption of inflating aircraft rental fees at PT Garuda Indonesia (Persero).

Head of the Attorney General's Office for Legal Information, Leonard Eben Ezer Simanjuntak, said that the four witnesses who were being questioned were officials at the state-owned airline.

"Tuesday, January 25, 2022, the Investigating Prosecutors Team will examine four witnesses," Leonard said in a written statement received in Jakarta Wednesday.

The four witnesses examined, namely R as Senior Manager of PT Garuda Indonesia (Persero) Tbk, Capt. AW as Executive Project Manager, WW as Strategic PV and Network Planning, and AB as Vice President (VP) Treasury Section of PT. Garuda Indonesia (Persero) Tbk.

"The witnesses were examined regarding the mechanism for planning, procuring and paying for aircraft," said Leonard.

Previously, investigators also questioned the Director of PT Garuda Indonesia with the initials IS, Monday, January 24. The Director of JAMPidsus Investigations at the Attorney General's Office, Supardi, said that the IS investigation was related to the sprindik issued regarding the procurement of aircraft rental funds.

The Attorney General's Office has raised the status of the alleged corruption case of PT Garuda Indonesia (Persero) to the general investigation stage on Wednesday, January 19.

In the first stage, investigators studied the ATR 72-600 aircraft.

Attorney General Sanitiar Burhanuddin said the investigation would expand not only to ATR 72-600 but also Bombardier, Airbus, Boeing, and Rolls Royce. This coordination is because there are several cases that have been completed at the KPK related to corruption cases at Garuda Indonesia.

Therefore, coordination with the KPK will facilitate the steps of investigators in the Special Crimes of the Attorney General's Office because the evidence and construction of evidence may already be in the KPK.

On the same occasion, the Deputy Attorney General for Special Crimes (JAMPidsus) of the Indonesian Attorney General's Office, Febrie Adriansyah, revealed that this case resulted in considerable losses to the state.

He gave an example, for the procurement of aircraft leases indicated (losses) of Rp. 3.6 trillion.

Please note that the losses that occurred at Garuda took place when ES served as president director. Febrie said that ES has been processed by the KPK and is currently serving a sentence. However, there are still losses at Garuda.

Therefore, the Attorney General ordered his party to conduct an investigation in order to clearly see who was responsible beyond what was determined by the KPK and how they could try to recover from the loss.