KPK Is Requested to Finish the Case of BPD Kaltim

VIVAnews -- Performance of Regional Development Banks (BPD) continues to receive great attention. Currently, the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) was in the investigation of illegal practices of some of the deposit from BPD to officials at provincial and district levels in some areas.

Cases of illegal deposits in some BPD are seemingly only one of the alleged unhealthy practices that occur in BPD environment. "Its existence, which is far from the supervision of the central institutions’ law enforcement, seems to open greater opportunities for the occurrence of these unhealthy practices.

These unhealthy practices lead to corruption activities that potentially cause significant financial losses to the country, "he said. One of the suspected unhealthy banking practices is the problematic credit channeling by BPD Kaltim to a company.

Legally, the party applying for a loan was indeed a community cooperative as plasma farmer. However, the corporate guarantor was that company. "The fact, it was also that company that manages and uses the credit funds.

Therefore, it can be said that the substantial creditor is that company. The credit was worth around. Rp 219 billion which is realized in July 2009 for the purposes of development and management of community’s oil palm plasma plantations in the area of 1200 hectares in Kutai Kartanegara.

There was an allegation that the credit funds were not used for the development and management of oil palm plantations plasma belongs to the people. This allegation comes after seeing a very slow process of plantation development.

"Almost all plantation development schedule starting from land clearing, construction of roads, construction of drainage until seeding time deviated from the limit that have previously set," the spokesman of Transparansi Otonomi Daerah, Ahmad Dede Kurnia explained on Sunday, January 10, 2010.

"If in the end the people's plantation development fails then most likely the loans will be bad and that means financial losses have led to the state.
In addition, if the people’s plantation development by that company fails then it will surely cause the loss for the local people as the owners and possibly also as oil palm plantation workers.
Moreover, the physical guarantee of that loan is the plantation areas that are currently being developed. If in the future the credit turns into bad and the bank conduct the foreclosures, the people own of the land will suffer from two great losses.
The first loss is that they loss their income and livelihood because plantation development has failed, while the second loss arising from people's land that was eventually confiscated by the bank for a loan guarantee.
Therefore, the Commission (KPK) must act quickly, and make this as a priority considering the potential financial losses are very big country and far beyond the limits of investigation under the authority of the Commission which is only Rp 1 billion.
They also requested the Commission (KPK) to also see the detail quality of work in the plantation development done by company, whether or not it is in conformity with what had been promised. "Regarding the provision of seeds, for example, it has to be seen whether the seeds provided are actually in the quality and price as agreed upon," said Ahmad Dede Kurnia.
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