Warna Warni Bali |

Ni Komang Erviani, The Jakarta Post, Denpasar | Wed, 12/07/2011 11:37 AM |

The Bali Corruption Court got tough during its first trial on Tuesday by ordering that a woman defendant be kept in custody for the duration of the trial with the presiding judge vowing a speedy trial.

Regional corruption courts were established in provinces across Indonesia following a Constitutional Court ruling in 2006 stating that the corruption court in Jakarta lacked both the legal foundation and jurisdiction to process corruption cases from regions outside Jakarta. The performance of the regional courts have been criticized recently for being soft on defendants. Acquittals of graft suspects in Samarinda and Bandung caused public uproar and growing demands for the regional corruption courts to be dissolved.

The Bali Corruption Court started its debut trial in a room of the Denpasar District Court. The first case to go to trial was related to the provincial transportation agency’s road signs development project, which covered 80 kilometers of road in Denpasar, Singaraja and Amlapura. The primary defendant is Endah Suparsetyaningsih, 47, the director of Pradana Tehnik, the company that won the bid for the Rp 2.14 billion (US$237,540) project. Seven other individuals have also been indicted in the case.

Prosecutor I Made Tangkas accused Endah and scores of the agency’s officials of doctoring the project’s final report to make it appear that the project had been completed on time. However, a field inspection carried out by detectives, experts from Udayana University and an agency team revealed that the project had not been completed.

“There are 20.5 kilometers of road that have yet to be equipped with proper signs. In this case, the state suffered a loss of Rp 942 million,” he said.

Endah was charged under articles of the Corruption Law that carry sentences of 15 years to life imprisonment.

“The defendant breached the law to gain financial benefit for herself and her corporation,” he said.

The defendant claimed that she did not understand the substance of the indictment. Presiding judge IGB Komang Wijaya Adhi then announced that the defendant would be taken to the detention center immediately after the hearing.

“I order the prosecutor to place the defendant in custody for the next 20 days,” he said, adding that the panel of judges had the authority to extend the detention period by up to 60 days.