Former Social Minister Juliari Mentioned Sri Mulyasi's Name While Witnesses In The Bansos Corruption Case

Former Social Minister Juliari Batubara At The Corruption Court (Bermasker)/PHOTO: Rizky Adytia-VOI

JAKARTA - Former Social Minister Juliari P Batubara mentioned the name of the Minister of Finance, Sri Mulyani, when testifying in the trial of the alleged corruption case of rice social assistance (bansos) for the Family Beneficiary of the Family Hope Program at the Ministry of Social Affairs in 2020 2021, with the defendant Muhammad Kuncoro Wibowo and his friends.

Sri Mulyani said that it started when the public prosecutor or prosecutor questioned Juliari P Batubara regarding the distribution of rice social assistance at the Ministry of Social Affairs in 2020-2021.

"Please explain your knowledge about the distribution of BSB handled by the Ministry of Social Affairs, sir?" asked the prosecutor during a trial at the Corruption Court at the Central Jakarta District Court, Wednesday, March 6.

"Yes, in general, sir, we answered what we still remember. Yes, the point is to give rice, in the order of 10 kilos I forgot, 10 or 15 kilos I forgot to KPM PKH sir and it was run for 3 months if I'm not mistaken, October to December 2020," said Juliari.

Juliari explained that the idea of the social assistance program emerged when he learned that Bulog rice stocks were excessive during the COVID-19 pandemic. Moreover, the Ministry of Social Affairs is also running the basic food assistance program and cash assistance.

"Initially, sir, the trigger was actually Bulog, which has a high stock of rice, sir. At that time, it was COVID-19, we also ran several non-regular programs, namely basic food assistance for Jabodetabek and also cash social assistance for outside Jabodetabek," he said.

"Incidentally, Bulog several times conveyed in meetings including in limited meetings several times that they had excessive stock reserves," continued Juliari.

After conveying this, Juliari mentioned Sri Mulyani's name. Because, they had discussions about the use of bulog rice in the social assistance program informally.

The only goal is to avoid a buildup of rice stocks in Bulog's warehouse.

"Then, at that time there was a discussion, frankly at that time I had a discussion, officially sir, by telephone with Mrs. Sri Mulyani, sir, Minister of Finance, informally by telephone. Finally, we concluded, let's just propose that the bulog rice be given as social assistance, sir," said Juliari.

"So that it can come out quickly, sir, so there is no stock buildup in the Bulog warehouse, we convey it at a limited meeting and the president agrees that we run the program, sir, at first it was like that, sir. In implementation for technical purposes, yes, because we have procurement teams and others, yes they are running it," he continued.

In this case, Muhammad Kuncoro Wibowo as President Director of PT Bhanda Ghara Reksa (Persero) was charged with engineering the consulting work by appointing PT Primalayan Teknologi Persada as a consultant for PT Bhanda Ghara Reksa (Persero) in the distribution of the Ministry of Social Affairs' rice assistance.

Muhammad Kuncoro Wibowo was also charged with harming the state's finances or economy in the amount of Rp. 127,144,055,620, as stated in the Report on the Results of Investigative Examination Number: LHA-AF-17/DNA/11/2023 dated December 4, 2023 by the Directorate of Corruption Detection and Analysis of the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK).

For his actions, Muhammad Kuncoro Wibowo was charged with violating Article 2 paragraph (1) or Article 3 of Law Number 31 of 1999 concerning the Eradication of Corruption in conjunction with Article 55 paragraph (1) of the 1st Criminal Code.