Indonesia. Seething after a team investigating graft at the Constitutional Court spoke of him having accepted bribes, Judge Akil Mochtar on Friday filed a complaint against his accusers with the Corruption Eradication Commission.
The embattled judge, along with Constitutional Court Chief Justice Mahfud MD, told the commission, known as the KPK, that the lawyers for the district chief who allegedly bribed Akil were also culpable in the scandal because they did not report it directly to law enforcement.
Refly Harun, one of the lawyers, included the allegation in an October opinion piece he wrote for Kompas newspaper. In reaction to that piece, Mahfud invited Refly to assemble a team to investigate the court for signs of corruption, which Refly has done.
In the Kompas piece, Refly described how Simalungun district chief J.R. Saragih, his one-time client, had paid Rp 1 billion ($111,000) to Akil for a ruling that would help him retain his victory in a district election in August.
Refly wrote that Saragih had underpaid his legal fees, giving him only Rp 2 billion of Rp 3 billion owed because he had to give the other billion to Akil. Refly wrote that Saragih said he had paid the money to Akil through his driver, Purwanto.
Akil now says Refly and his co-counsel, Maheswara Prabandono, are partially to blame in the bribe attempt because they did not report it to authorities at the time.
“There are only two options: Either they or I must go to jail,” Akil said. “If the KPK finds that I am wrong, I’m ready to receive a sanction. But if they are wrong, they should be punished.”
Both Purwanto and Saragih have denied Refly’s claims. Purwanto said he knew nothing about the regional election, being only a driver, while Saragih said in a televised interview on Friday that he had not sought to bribe Akil.
Saragih has also denied Refly’s claim that Saragih owed him Rp 3 billion in legal fees, saying they had agreed on a figure of Rp 600 million.
He also said he had never been questioned by the investigative team.
Akil said he was not the only one angered by Refly’s accusations, and that the lawyer had ruffled many feathers at the Constitutional Court.
“I heard in a dialogue that Refly said that he only trusted Mahfud and that the other justices are not clean,” Akil said. “All of the judges were upset because of the statement.”
Akil also threatened to report Refly for defamation if a KPK investigation failed to prove Refly’s accusation that the judge had taken bribes.
The fact-finding team has so far been unable to prove the allegations of bribery against Akil.
However, it did find that a court clerk — identified as Mahfud, though no relation to the chief justice — had received money and land titles from Dirwan Mahmud, the South Bengkulu district chief, to assure a favorable ruling in his own electoral dispute.
Dirwan did not win the case, and the land certificate as well as Rp 58 million had been returned to Dirwan, the team said.
The lawyer representing the clerk has said his client accused two relatives of Judge Arsyad Sanusi, who was on the panel that heard the case, of also receiving bribes from Dirwan. He identified them as Nesyawati and Zaimar, the judge’s daughter and brother-in-law.
Judge Mahfud has promised to report the case to the legal enforcers within a week.
The Constitutional Court is considered by many as one of the last clean state institutions, and Mahfud has continued to claim that it remains so. On Wednesday, Mahfud said he would resign if the team found conclusively that judges in his court were corrupt.
He has not resigned, saying that so far all the investigative team had found was suspected bribery by an individual clerk, not judges or the institution.
Mahfud also said that since the court was the sole body empowered to deal with electoral disputes, people often tried to profit from the situation by claiming to be able to influence a verdict in favor of those willing to pay.
The embattled judge, along with Constitutional Court Chief Justice Mahfud MD, told the commission, known as the KPK, that the lawyers for the district chief who allegedly bribed Akil were also culpable in the scandal because they did not report it directly to law enforcement.
Refly Harun, one of the lawyers, included the allegation in an October opinion piece he wrote for Kompas newspaper. In reaction to that piece, Mahfud invited Refly to assemble a team to investigate the court for signs of corruption, which Refly has done.
In the Kompas piece, Refly described how Simalungun district chief J.R. Saragih, his one-time client, had paid Rp 1 billion ($111,000) to Akil for a ruling that would help him retain his victory in a district election in August.
Refly wrote that Saragih had underpaid his legal fees, giving him only Rp 2 billion of Rp 3 billion owed because he had to give the other billion to Akil. Refly wrote that Saragih said he had paid the money to Akil through his driver, Purwanto.
Akil now says Refly and his co-counsel, Maheswara Prabandono, are partially to blame in the bribe attempt because they did not report it to authorities at the time.
“There are only two options: Either they or I must go to jail,” Akil said. “If the KPK finds that I am wrong, I’m ready to receive a sanction. But if they are wrong, they should be punished.”
Both Purwanto and Saragih have denied Refly’s claims. Purwanto said he knew nothing about the regional election, being only a driver, while Saragih said in a televised interview on Friday that he had not sought to bribe Akil.
Saragih has also denied Refly’s claim that Saragih owed him Rp 3 billion in legal fees, saying they had agreed on a figure of Rp 600 million.
He also said he had never been questioned by the investigative team.
Akil said he was not the only one angered by Refly’s accusations, and that the lawyer had ruffled many feathers at the Constitutional Court.
“I heard in a dialogue that Refly said that he only trusted Mahfud and that the other justices are not clean,” Akil said. “All of the judges were upset because of the statement.”
Akil also threatened to report Refly for defamation if a KPK investigation failed to prove Refly’s accusation that the judge had taken bribes.
The fact-finding team has so far been unable to prove the allegations of bribery against Akil.
However, it did find that a court clerk — identified as Mahfud, though no relation to the chief justice — had received money and land titles from Dirwan Mahmud, the South Bengkulu district chief, to assure a favorable ruling in his own electoral dispute.
Dirwan did not win the case, and the land certificate as well as Rp 58 million had been returned to Dirwan, the team said.
The lawyer representing the clerk has said his client accused two relatives of Judge Arsyad Sanusi, who was on the panel that heard the case, of also receiving bribes from Dirwan. He identified them as Nesyawati and Zaimar, the judge’s daughter and brother-in-law.
Judge Mahfud has promised to report the case to the legal enforcers within a week.
The Constitutional Court is considered by many as one of the last clean state institutions, and Mahfud has continued to claim that it remains so. On Wednesday, Mahfud said he would resign if the team found conclusively that judges in his court were corrupt.
He has not resigned, saying that so far all the investigative team had found was suspected bribery by an individual clerk, not judges or the institution.
Mahfud also said that since the court was the sole body empowered to deal with electoral disputes, people often tried to profit from the situation by claiming to be able to influence a verdict in favor of those willing to pay.
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