Former Mayor Tual's Mode Of Being Entangled In Corruption: Tricks For Natural Disasters To Make Liquid Rice Reserves

Former Mayor of Tual AR and his staff AAR were escorted to the detention car to the Ambon Detention Center after the Maluku Police Ditreskrimsus transferred the phase II case files to the Maluku Prosecutor's Office. (15/5) (ANTARA/daniel/)

Assistant for Special Crimes at the Maluku Attorney General's Office, Triyono Wahyudi, said that his party had detained the former Mayor of Tual AR and a staff with the initials AAR in the 2017 case of alleged corruption in the Government Rice Reserve (CBP) budget. "We entrusted the two suspects to the Ambon Detention Center after the prosecutor received the second phase of the transfer of files from the Maluku Police Criminal Investigation Directorate," Triyono said in Ambon, as reported by Antara, Wednesday, May 15. State financial losses in this case amounted to Rp1.8 billion and so far no funds have been returned to the prosecutor's office. According to the files from the Directorate of Criminal Investigation of the Maluku Police, there are two suspects in this case, then the prosecutor will prepare an indictment to be transferred to the court. AR issued an oral order to suspect AAR as the Head of Distribution and Social Assistance to make an administration for the determination of emergency response status in Tual City. The status determination administration stated that in the Tual City area, there have been natural disasters in the form of long Kemarau and extreme weather, so farmers experience crop failure and fishermen cannot go to sea so that people experience food shortages without a study from related technical agencies. Based on his personal assessment, the suspect signed a letter determining the emergency response status which was used as the basis for the request or use of the Tual City Government Rice Reserve. Even though in that area there were no natural disasters. It is suspected that the use of the CBP is not in accordance with its designation and is more of a political interest. For the actions of the suspects, the state suffered a loss of Rp1,807,002,120 based on the audit report on the results of the State Financial Losses Calculation by the Maluku Province Representative BPKP. The suspects are subject to Article 2 paragraph (1) and/or Article 3 in conjunction with Article 18 of the Republic of Indonesia Law Number 31 of 1999, as amended by Law Number 20 of 2021 concerning amendments to Law Number 31 of 1999 concerning Eradication of Criminal Acts of Corruption in conjunction with Article 55 paragraph (1) to -1 and Article 64 of the Criminal Code.

After going through a series of phase II administrations, the suspects were taken to the Class IIA Ambon Detention Center to be detained for 20 days starting from May 15, 2024 to June 03, 2024.