Neneng’s arrest leads to diplomatic brouhaha

JAKARTA. Malaysia’s top diplomat in Indonesia says that the two Malaysians who allegedly aided graft suspect Neneng Sri Wahyuni when she was a fugitive in that country were not linked to any Malaysian royal family.

Corruption Eradication Commission deputy chairman Bambang Widjojanto previously said that the men, Razmi bin Muhammad Yusof and Hasan bin Kushi, were advisers to a Malaysian sultanate.

Malaysian Ambassador to Indonesia Dato Syed Munshe Afdzaruddin Bin Syed Hassan denied that statement. “There is a difference between an adviser to a sultanate and an employee of a sultanate. Nevertheless, the two were neither advisers nor employees,” Afdzaruddin said at a visit to the KPK’s headquarters in South Jakarta on Thursday.

Afdzaruddin said that the Malaysian government had arrested the pair and were now verifying their identities.

Meanwhile, the commission announced that the detention center at its headquarters had a new inmate.

“The KPK will detain a suspect identified as NSW at the commission’s detention center for the next 20 days,” KPK spokesperson Johan Budi told a press conference on Thursday, referring to Neneng by her initials.

Neneng would occupy a cell opposite graft convict Mindo Rosalina Manulang, the former employee of Neneng’s husband, Muhammad Nazaruddin, who testified against him at the Jakarta Corruption Court.

Neneng and Nazaruddin own a holding firm called the Permai Group that has been implicated in a bribery scandal involving a contract issued by the Manpower and Transmigration Ministry project in 2008 to procure Rp 8.9 billion (US$943,400) in solar power equipment in 2008.

Neneng was named a suspect in August for allegedly rigging the ministry’s tender to win the project using PT Alfindo Nuratama Perkasa, a subsidiary of the Permai Group.

The husband-and-wife duo fled Indonesia to avoid investigators last year.

Nazaruddin was arrested in Cartagena, Colombia, in August, while the last time the KPK heard of Neneng before her arrest earlier this week was in April.

KPK investigators arrested Neneng in her residence in Pejaten, South Jakarta, on Wednesday.

“We arrested her based on information from members of the public and this could mean just about anybody who could give information to us,” Johan said. (Rabby Pramudatama/ The Jakarta Post)