AGO Seeks Evidence Of Steel Import Corruption Cases At The Ministry Of Industry

PHOTO DOK Puspenkum Kejagung

JAKARTA - The Director of Investigation of the Deputy Attorney General for Special Crimes (Jampidsus) at the Attorney General's Office, Supardi, revealed that the Ministry of Industry (Kemenperin) conducted a search for evidence of steel imports in the alleged corruption case which is being handled by his staff.

According to him, his party is currently exploring the steel import quota issued by the Ministry of Industry as the competent authority.

"We are in the framework of collecting evidence, which is important because the parties related to export-import are related to quotas of all kinds," Supardi said as quoted by Antara, Thursday, March 31.

The search was carried out at the Directorate General of Metal, Machinery, Transportation Equipment and Electronics (ILMATE) at the Ministry of Industry. During the search, investigators found electronic evidence.

Unlike the search conducted at the Ministry of Trade (Kemendag) last week, the investigating prosecutor found a number of confiscated evidence including electronic evidence in the form of PCs, laptops and cellphones, documents of explanation letters and import approvals (PI) related to the import of steel, as well as money. cash worth Rp. 63,350,000.

According to Supardi, during a search, investigators do not have to find evidence of money, because the purpose of the search is to find evidence. The evidence is not necessarily in the form of money, but can be documents and electronic evidence.

"Because we searched, the place has been determined. We determined the place based on previous examinations. Oh, this needs to be searched, then permission is given to the PN (district court)," said Supardi.

As previously reported, a search was also conducted at the PT Prasasti Metal Utama office, which is located at Jalan Buni Number 3a, Mangga Besar, West Jakarta. In this activity, investigators collaborated with the digital forensics team of the Attorney General's Office.

From the two places searched, investigators confiscated two digital evidences in the form of an iMac A 1311 personal computer and a server dump file http://intranew.kemenperin.go.id which was saved to a flash disk.

Previously, the Head of the Legal Information Center (Kapuspenkum) at the Attorney General's Office, Ketut Sumedana, explained that cases of alleged criminal acts occurred between 2016 and 2021. There were six companies importing iron or steel, steel guides and their derivative products using an explanation letter (Sujel) or import agreements. without PI and LS issued by the Directorate of Imports of the Ministry of Trade.

The Sujel was issued on the basis of an importer's request with the reason that it was used in the context of procuring construction materials for road and bridge construction projects on the pretext of having a cooperation agreement with four SOEs.

The four SOEs are PT Waskita Karya, PT Wijaya Karya, PT Nindya Karya and PT Pertamina Gas (Pertagas).

"After clarification, the four SOEs apparently never cooperated in procuring project materials, either in the form of iron or steel, with the six importers," said Ketut.

It is suspected that the six importers also imported alloy steel using Sujel I on May 26, 2020 with the excuse that it was for the purposes of road and bridge construction projects, whereas in reality the road and bridge projects in question had been completed in 2018.

"So he (the importer) admits this even though the project itself has been completed," he said.

According to Ketut, an indication of irregularities in the use of Sujel related to the exemption of permits for the importation of iron or steel, alloy steel and their derivative products carried out by the six importers.

The six importers, namely PT Jaya Arya Kemuning; PT Duta Sari Sejahtera; PT Intisource Bajasakti; PT Prasasti Metal Utama; PT Bangun Era Sejahtera; and PT Perwira Adhitama.

Based on this, the importer is indicated to have committed a criminal act of corruption as regulated in Article 2 juhcto Article 3 of Law Number 31 of 1999 concerning the Eradication of Criminal Acts of Corruption as amended by Law Number 20 of 2001 concerning Amendments to Law Number 31 of 1999 concerning Eradication of Criminal Acts of Corruption. .

"So the six companies did not import according to their designation and it turned out that they had never entered into a cooperation agreement with the four SOEs," said Ketut.