Latest news with #HarliSiregar
Reuters
16-07-2025
- Business
- Reuters
Indonesia's GoTo says it respects ongoing legal process after reports authorities raided GoTo's office
JAKARTA, July 12 (Reuters) - Indonesian tech firm GoTo Gojek Tokopedia ( opens new tab said in a statement late on Friday that it respects the ongoing legal process and will be supportive of any efforts to uphold the law. GoTo's statement came after media reports saying Indonesia's attorney general's office raided GoTo's office related to an investigation into alleged corruption in the education ministry's laptop procurement in the period of 2019-2022. GoTo has not been accused of any wrongdoing. "We are cooperating with the authorities and following their directions," GoTo's director of public affairs and communications Ade Mulya said in the statement. The attorney general's office raided GoTo's office on Tuesday and confiscated various evidence, according to state news agency Antara, quoting the attorney general's office spokesperson Harli Siregar.
The Star
12-07-2025
- Business
- The Star
Indonesian oil tycoon Riza Chalid named suspect in Pertamina corruption case
Attorney General's Office spokesperson Harli Siregar (left) and the Office of the Assistant Attorney General for Extraordinary Crimes investigation director Abdul Qohar (right) address journalists during a press briefing about the suspect naming in the fuel import corruption case at the AGO headquarters in Jakarta on July 10, 2025. - Antara via The Jakarta Post/ANN JAKARTA: The Attorney General's Office (AGO) has named oil tycoon Muhammad Riza Chalid a suspect in a corruption case pertaining to fuel imports at subsidiaries of state-owned oil and gas giant Pertamina that incurred trillions in state losses. Investigators at the Office of the Assistant Attorney General for Extraordinary Crimes (Jampidsus) found enough evidence to name the businessman a suspect amid their investigation into the case in which seven suspects were arrested in February. Among the suspects previously arrested by the AGO was Riza's son Kerry Adrianto, a beneficial owner of a private oil and gas shipping company. Riza, identified as the beneficial owner of PT Tangki Merak and PT Orbit Terminal Merak (OTM), allegedly agreed on a deal with Pertamina to lease the Merak fuel terminal in Banten at a time when the state oil and gas company did not require additional storage. He allegedly did so by intervening in Pertamina's governance policy, scrapped the Merak fuel terminal's asset ownership scheme in the contract and inflated its value, AGO spokesperson Harli Siregar said during a press briefing on Thursday (July 10). Investigators suspect that Riza conspired with then Pertamina supply and distribution vice president Alfian Nasution and marketing and trading director Hanung Budya and OTM president director Gading Ramadhan Joedo; the latter has been in AGO custody since February. Riza, Alfian and Hanung were among nine suspects named by the AGO on Thursday for allegedly causing state losses of up to Rp 285 trillion (US$17 billion) through irregularities in fuel trade planning and procurement, product compensation schemes and the below-market sale of non-subsidised diesel to private and state-owned enterprises. The estimated state losses were raised from a previous Rp 196 trillion when the AGO made the first wave of arrests in February. All suspects were arrested on Thursday, except for Riza who remains at large. AGO investigators believe that he is currently residing in Singapore. 'Riza failed to respond to three summonses for interrogation, but we have been coordinating with our representatives in Singapore to locate and bring him in,' Jampidsus investigation director Abdul Qohar said in Thursday's televised press briefing. Should Riza be found to reside in Singapore, the AGO may utilise a treaty between the city state and Indonesia that grants extradition for various offences, including corruption, money laundering and bribery, according to the laws of both countries and safeguards provided in the agreement. Indonesian authorities have used the treaty in an attempt to secure the return of Paulus Tannos, a businessman who was named a suspect in another high-profile graft case involving e-ID procurement. But the effort has yet to bear fruit, as Tannos has challenged Indonesia's extradition request in a Singaporean court. The AGO said that it had been looking into Riza's potential involvement in the Pertamina graft case since it arrested his son Kerry in February. The initial investigation revealed that the illicit scheme allegedly involved the procurement of lower-octane subsidised gasoline to be sold fraudulently at a higher price. The Pertamina case was not the first scandal to hit Riza, a longtime player in the country's oil trade who was known as the 'gasoline godfather' for his domination of the oil import business. He was previously linked to a case in 2008 involving the import of 600,000 barrels of mixed crude oil sold by his company Global Energy Resource to Petral, a trading firm owned by Pertamina. The case allegedly caused the state energy firm to lose some Rp 65 billion, but the investigation was later dropped by the police after they claimed no state losses had been incurred. The businessman later found himself at the center of another scandal in 2015. At that time, he and then-House of Representatives speaker Setya Novanto of the Golkar Party sought shares and projects from gold miner PT Freeport Indonesia in exchange for using his supposed influence over then-president Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo to secure a contract extension for the company. There was no formal criminal investigation into Riza or Setya in that scandal, which became known by the public as "papa minta saham" (daddy wants shares). Energy watchdog Centre of Energy and Resources Indonesia (CERI) lauded the AGO for naming Riza a suspect in the Pertamina corruption case and expressed the hope that investigators can successfully arrest him. 'Wherever he is now, we believe authorities will bring him in to hold him accountable,' CERI executive director Yusri Usman said in a statement on Friday, while conveying the hope that the AGO could expand the investigation to other suspects. The fuel import case has been seen as a test for President Prabowo Subianto, who has vowed that his government will not tolerate corruption and has threatened hefty prison sentences for offenders. When the AGO named nine suspects in the case in February, analysts urged the President to take direct action to dismantle the deeply entrenched corruption in the country's oil and gas business. - The Jakarta Post/ANN
Business Times
26-06-2025
- Politics
- Business Times
Indonesia signs wiretapping pacts with telco operators; analysts flag privacy concerns
[JAKARTA] Indonesia's Attorney General Office has signed an agreement with four telecommunication operators to install wiretapping devices, an official from the Office said, raising questions among analysts about the potential impact on privacy and surveillance. The agreement, signed on Jun 24, would allow prosecutors to access telecommunication recordings and enable data exchange for law enforcement purposes, the Attorney General Office spokesperson Harli Siregar told Reuters on Thursday (Jun 26). 'We have many fugitives and need technology to detect them,' Siregar said, referring to the agreement signed with the country's largest telco company Telekomunikasi Indonesia and its unit Telekomunikasi Selular, as well as two other companies Indosat, and XLSMART Telecom Sejahtera. The pacts, which would include mobile phones, are in accordance with a law passed in 2021 giving wiretapping authority to the Attorney General Office, Siregar added. Indonesia's police and anti-graft agency are already able to use wiretapping, Wahyudi Djafar, an analyst focused on digital governance and public policy told Reuters. But he said the new arrangement with the Attorney General Office could allow prosecutors to use surveillance even on the grounds of suspicion without formal charges or legally named suspects in an investigation. A NEWSLETTER FOR YOU Friday, 8.30 am Asean Business Business insights centering on South-east Asia's fast-growing economies. Sign Up Sign Up Djafar, who is the Public Policy Director at Rakhsa Initiatives, an Indonesia-based think tank focused on digital governance and strategic security issues, said he feared the agreement could potentially widen the scope of wiretapping and lead to mass surveillance. 'There is no clear limitation on how the wiretap will be conducted and for how long and who can use the data,' he said, adding 'the (AGO) office's wiretapping power will be stronger than the police and anti-graft agency.' The Attorney General Office spokesperson Siregar, responding to the privacy concerns, said the office will only wiretap fugitives. When asked about the extent of the wiretapping powers, Siregar said the act would 'not be done arbitrarily.' Damar Juniarto, a board member at global rights group Amnesty International in Indonesia, said the wiretapping agreements would mean more state agencies doing surveillance, potentially further threatening civil liberties. Indonesia's Presidential Communication Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment regarding the concerns about the impact of wiretapping laws on civil liberties. Merza Fachys, a director at XLSMART, one of the telco companies, told Reuters that the Attorney General Office is one of the state agencies allowed to wiretap, and ensures customer data would be safe. A data protection law, passed in 2022, imposes corporate fines for mishandling customers' data. The biggest fine is 2 per cent of a corporation's annual revenue and could see their assets confiscated or auctioned off. REUTERS
Reuters
26-06-2025
- Politics
- Reuters
Indonesia signs wiretapping pacts with telco operators; analysts flag privacy concerns
JAKARTA, June 26 (Reuters) - Indonesia's Attorney General Office has signed an agreement with four telecommunication operators to install wiretapping devices, an official from the Office said, raising questions among analysts about the potential impact on privacy and surveillance. The agreement, signed on Tuesday, would allow prosecutors to access telecommunication recordings and enable data exchange for law enforcement purposes, the Attorney General Office spokesperson Harli Siregar told Reuters on Thursday. "We have many fugitives and need technology to detect them," Siregar said, referring to the agreement signed with the country's largest telco company Telekomunikasi Indonesia and its unit Telekomunikasi Selular, as well as two other companies Indosat, and XLSMART Telecom Sejahtera. The pacts, which would include mobile phones, are in accordance with a law passed in 2021 giving wiretapping authority to the Attorney General Office, Siregar added. Indonesia's police and anti-graft agency are already able to use wiretapping, Wahyudi Djafar, an analyst focused on digital governance and public policy told Reuters. But he said the new arrangement with the Attorney General Office could allow prosecutors to use surveillance even on the grounds of suspicion without formal charges or legally named suspects in an investigation. Djafar, who is the Public Policy Director at Rakhsa Initiatives, an Indonesia-based think tank focused on digital governance and strategic security issues, said he feared the agreement could potentially widen the scope of wiretapping and lead to mass surveillance. "There is no clear limitation on how the wiretap will be conducted and for how long and who can use the data," he said, adding "the (AGO) office's wiretapping power will be stronger than the police and anti-graft agency." The Attorney General Office spokesperson Siregar, responding to the privacy concerns, said the office will only wiretap fugitives. When asked about the extent of the wiretapping powers, Siregar said the act would "not be done arbitrarily." Damar Juniarto, a board member at global rights group Amnesty International in Indonesia, said the wiretapping agreements would mean more state agencies doing surveillance, potentially further threatening civil liberties. Indonesia's Presidential Communication Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment regarding the concerns about the impact of wiretapping laws on civil liberties. Merza Fachys, a director at XLSMART, one of the telco companies, told Reuters that the Attorney General Office is one of the state agencies allowed to wiretap, and ensures customer data would be safe. A data protection law, passed in 2022, imposes corporate fines for mishandling customers' data. The biggest fine is 2% of a corporation's annual revenue and could see their assets confiscated or auctioned off.
Business Times
18-06-2025
- Business
- Business Times
Wilmar's record payout of S$928m marks Indonesia's deepening crackdown on palm oil graft
[JAKARTA] The Indonesian authorities' seizure of 11.8 trillion rupiah (S$928 million) from agri-giant Wilmar Group is not only the country's largest asset confiscation, but also unprecedented for the company voluntarily handing the amount over in cash – a move legal experts say enables prosecutors to sidestep the complexities of liquidating seized property. The move throws a spotlight on Jakarta's stepped-up efforts to root out graft in the palm oil sector, following allegations of misconduct during a severe shortage of cooking oil in late 2021 to early 2022, which exposed governance lapses in one of Indonesia's most vital industries. Harli Siregar, the spokesperson for the Attorney-General's Office (AGO), told The Business Times: 'This was the largest seizure of funds in the history of ongoing cases.' The sum, representing nearly two-thirds of Wilmar's net income last year, was handed over at the authorities' request as a gesture of the company's 'good faith and innocence' in the ongoing case. Abdul Fickar Hadjar, a criminal law specialist at Trisakti University, said the confiscated funds could strengthen the prosecution's appeal against the ruling by a lower court in March, which had acquitted Wilmar and two other palm oil companies. He said: 'This makes it easier for prosecutors to present additional evidence in the Supreme Court appeal. Seized assets are typically in the form of valuables like property or goods, which are more difficult to use as evidence because they usually need to be auctioned off first.' A NEWSLETTER FOR YOU Friday, 8.30 am Asean Business Business insights centering on South-east Asia's fast-growing economies. Sign Up Sign Up The Wilmar case, still unfolding amid Indonesia's broader push to reform its palm oil industry, is now before the country's Supreme Court, which will review the lower court's judgment on points of law. Palm oil purge In 2023, Indonesia, the world's largest producer and exporter of palm oil, set up a task force to enhance governance in the industry and to boost state revenue. The AGO said it has handed over to the state some 217,000 hectares of palm oil plantation land – assets seized from corruption cases over the last seven years. The last major seizure was made in a high-profile case involving tycoon Surya Darmadi, the owner of the Duta Palma Group, who was convicted of corruption over illegal changes in land use in Riau province between 2003 and 2022. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison. Last September, his appeal was thrown out by the Supreme Court, which upheld the jail sentence. Three months later, the AGO confiscated around five trillion rupiah in cash from the tycoon. Largest haul At a briefing held at the AGO's premises on Tuesday (Jun 17), members of the press were shown towering stacks of 100,000 rupiah banknotes confiscated in the Wilmar case. Observers deemed the striking display as a vivid testament to the scale of the corruption scandal. At a press briefing on Tuesday, Indonesia's Attorney-General's Office put on show trillions of rupiah in seized assets from the corruption case involving Wilmar Group and export permits for crude palm oil products. PHOTO: ATTORNEY-GENERAL'S OFFICE, JAKARTA Siregar said that the funds identified as state losses could be used to support the revitalisation of Indonesia's palm oil industry. In its statement, however, Wilmar said the funds were a security deposit ahead of the Supreme Court ruling on the 2022 palm oil export case, in which five Wilmar subsidiaries were accused of misconduct during the cooking oil crunch in the country. The company stated that the deposit will be refunded if the Supreme Court upholds the lower court's decision, but may be partially or fully forfeited if the ruling is overturned. Although the lower court had ruled in favour of Wilmar and two other palm oil traders in March, that verdict is now under fire, given the AGO's appeal against it, and the controversy that arose from judges having been accused of accepting bribes to rule in favour of the accused. Hadjar from Trisakti University said that while repaying state losses does not negate potential criminal liability, Wilmar's willingness to provide the security deposit could be viewed as a mitigating factor, depending on how the Supreme Court assesses the case. He also added that the company's move to surrender the funds may help the company manage the potential economic fallout. Sustainability in question The ongoing corruption case involving Wilmar Group's Indonesian units could pose a significant challenge to the company's reputation as a global sustainability leader in the palm oil industry. Observers say the case underscores the complex challenges multinational companies face in maintaining consistent governance and ethical standards across different jurisdictions – a crucial concern for investors and stakeholders who are increasingly prioritising sustainability and corporate responsibility. Professor Lawrence Loh, director of the Centre for Governance and Sustainability at the NUS Business School, said Wilmar has long positioned itself at the forefront of sustainable palm oil production. He warned that the case could hurt its reputation, especially among clients in markets such as Europe which are sensitive to environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors, as well as in the increasingly ESG-conscious Asian markets of China and India. 'The case primarily affects the governance aspect, as it involves (allegations of) lapses in business integrity and ethics,' he said. 'While cooperating with the authorities and returning funds may mitigate the ESG impact, they do not eliminate the underlying concerns about governance weaknesses. Rebuilding the company's reputation will be its most critical priority,' he added. In a statement on Tuesday, Wilmar Group said its five subsidiaries maintain that all their actions were carried out in good faith and without corrupt intent. On Wednesday, the shares of the group's Singapore-listed entity, Wilmar International, fell S$0.08 or 2.7 per cent to S$2.93, with 19 million shares traded.
