ICW Asks Kemenkumham Not To Glorify The Arrest Of BNI Bank Burglar Maria Pauline

Fugitive Maria Pauline Lumowa (Photo: Public Relations Kemenkumham)

JAKARTA - Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW) has asked the Ministry of Law and Human Rights (Kemenkumham) not to be involved in the success of extraditing the suspect who broke into BNI Bank, Maria Lumowa, who has been a fugitive for 17 years. Especially at this time Kemenkumham has much to do to hunt fugitives.

"ICW asks the Ministry of Law and Human Rights not to be involved in glorification over the success of extraditing the suspect Maria Pauline Lumowa. Because, some time ago, the portrait of law enforcement related to immigration authorities has caused many problems," said Kurnia in a written statement quoted on Sunday, June 12.

He gave an example that the Directorate General of Immigration had been conceded twice because he could not detect the arrival of former PDI-P candidate Harun Masiku, who had fled to Singapore after the KPK's arrest operation (OTT) and the convicted Bank Bali case Djoko Tjandra.

Kurnia said that in the past 20 years, ICW recorded at least 40 fugitives who were not caught by law enforcement and most of them are abroad. Thus, as the holder of central authority, Kemenkumham should act proactively as a coordinator and catalyst for extradition implementation.

"Kemenkumham must be active in tracing the whereabouts of these fugitives while pursuing a formal route through mutual legal assistance or extradition agreements between countries," he stressed while asking Kemenkumham to take a non-formal approach with other countries to easily find fugitives in other countries.

Another important thing that must be done by the government and DPR RI is to pass the Asset Confiscation Bill. Kurnia said that this draft law had actually been included in the DPR's national legislation program since 2012.

"However, the legislators seem to ignore the urgency of the ratification of this regulation. In fact, this bill is believed to maximize and accelerate the recovery of state losses due to corrupt practices because it is no longer dependent on presenting criminals," he said.

Previously, the Ministry of Law and Human Rights successfully completed the extradition process for the fugitive suspect in the BNI Bank fraud worth IDR 1.7 trillion, Maria Pauline Lumowa from Serbia. Maria is currently being brought to Indonesia to undergo trial for the case that entangled her.

Meanwhile, Maria Pauline Lumowa is the person most wanted by the Indonesian government. The reason was that the woman was a suspect in the cash burglary case at the Kebayoran Baru branch of BNI using a fictitious Letter of Credit (L / C) mode.

In the period from October 2002 to July 2003, Bank BNI suffered a loss of 136 million US dollars and 56 million euros or the equivalent of Rp 1.7 trillion based on the current exchange rate. This amount of money is a loan from PT Gramarindo Group owned by Maria Pauline Lumowa and Adrian Waworuntu.

BNI Bank began to feel suspicion. Because, the borrowing process which should be quite difficult because of the large nominal it runs very easily. It is suspected that PT Gramarindo Group was assisted by unscrupulous employees of Bank BNI because the loan application continued to agree with guarantees of L / C from Dubai Bank Kenya Ltd., Rosbank Switzerland, Middle East Bank Kenya Ltd., and The Wall Street Banking Corp.

Moreover, some of the banks that became the guarantor were not correspondence banks of Bank BNI. This suspicion grew stronger in June 2003. BNI investigated the financial transactions of PT Gramarindo Group. As a result, the company never made exports or was not in accordance with what was reported during the loan process.

Until finally, BNI reported the alleged fictitious L / C to the National Police Headquarters. However, Maria Pauline Lumowa left Indonesia by going to Singapore in September 2003 or a month before being named a suspect

From the results of the investigation, it was found that the woman had often been in the Netherlands in 2009 and often went back and forth to Singapore. In fact, it is known that Maria has been a Dutch citizen since 1979. Thus, the Indonesian government tried to apply for extradition to the Dutch government twice, to be precise in 2010 and 2014.

However, the Dutch Government rejected the request. Instead, it provides an option for Maria Pauline Lumowa to be tried in the Netherlands. Until finally, the woman was arrested on July 16, 2019, according to an Interpol red notice published in 2004.