Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry secretary-general Waryono Karno has been banned from traveling overseas by the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) in relation to a bribery case that has hit the ministry. Immigration directorate general spokesman Heriyanto said on Friday that the ban was issued on Thursday. “He will be banned [from traveling overseas] for [the next] six months,” he said. When asked to confirm the rumors that Waryono had fled to Singapore for medical reasons, Heriyanto said that he had not been made aware of such information. Besides Waryono, the KPK had also issued travel bans against five witnesses, including three officials at the upstream oil and gas regulatory special task force (SKKMigas), whose suspended chief, Rudi Rubiandini, is now detained on corruption charges. Rudi was caught red-handed accepting US$400,000 bribe from a total commitment fee of $700,000 from Singapore-based oil trading company Kernel Oil Pte Ltd. through an alleged middleman, Deviardi, who was Rudi’s golf trainer. The officials are oil, gas and condensate commercialization division head Agoes Sapto Raharjo Murdi Hartono, gas commercialization division head Popi Ahmad Nafis and operations support division head Iwan Ratman. Artha Meris Simbolon of PT Parna Raya Group, a holding company engaging in the energy, petrochemical, trading and shipping business, was also banned from traveling abroad. The travel ban was imposed following the seizure of a stash of money found in Waryono’s office at the ministry amounting to $200,000. The money is suspected to be a part of the bribe. The KPK said that it would summon Waryono to question him about the money, saying that it was highly suspicious that such a large amount of cash could end up inside a bag in his office. Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry Jero Wacik was quick to deny the allegations, saying that the money was to be used for operational purposes. The KPK, meanwhile, said that the money found in Waryono’s office was unlikely related to the Kernel Oil bribery case, but might be a bribe from other parties. According to a source close to Deviardi, however, Deviardi said that the money in Waryono’s office was not delivered by him. The same source also revealed that the president director of a large Indonesian coal mining company was behind the bribery case. The alleged mastermind, identified as GT, was the one who gave the bribe money to Deviardi to be delivered to Kernel Oil and Rudi, the source added. “The money could not have been from Deviardi since he does not posses that amount of cash,” the source told The Jakarta Post. The lawyer of Kernel Oil, Yanuar Prawira Wasesa, has confirmed that Deviardi told Kernel Oil president director Widodo Ratanachaithong that the money was actually from someone named BT, the nickname of GT. “But I don’t know who BT really is,” he told the Post. According to the source, BT cooperated with Widodo to win an oil tender at SKKMigas and masterminded the bribery scheme. Prior to the bribery attempt, BT, Rudi, Deviardi and Widodo had a meeting at the Fullerton Hotel in Singapore on July 20 to discuss the matter, the source added. The meeting was also attended by four officials of an unnamed Indonesian bank, he said. The source, however, said that he did not know the roles of the bank directors in the case.
Posted on: Sat, 31 Aug 2013 11:24:53 +0000
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