Suspended KPK Deputy Chair Bambang Widjojanto. (Antara Foto/Reno Esnir)

Jakarta. Acting Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) leader Johan Budi says that the case against former KPK deputy commissioner Bambang Widjojanto can be settled through a “deponeering” order issued by Attorney General H.M. Prasetyo, pending the approval of President Joko Widodo.

Deponeering means the Attorney General’s Office drops a case for the sake of public interest after considering the suggestions and opinions of related authorities.

“My own perspective is deponeering is the right move to [settle Bambang']s case, but this move must have presidential approval,” Johan said on Tuesday.

Johan said he will arrange to meet with Prasetyo and the president to discuss the deponeering proposal.

If both the president and the attorney general approve the proposal, Johan said he hoped Bambang could return to lead the anti-graft agency for the rest of his term, which ends in December.

Police have charged Bambang with compelling witnesses to perjure themselves in an election dispute hearing in 2010, when he served as a lawyer for one of the parties in the case.

The charge is widely seen as trumped up, and was filed just days after the KPK named Budi Gunawan, a police general nominated for National Police chief, a corruption suspect.

Deponeerings are not uncommon in high-profile cases. Former attorney general Basrief Arief issued a deponeering letter to drop charges against two former KPK commissioners — Bibit Rianto and Chandra Hamzah — from the controversial 2009 case in which the pair were named suspects for extortion and abuse of power in their handling of a graft case involving businessman Anggoro Widjojo.

Bibit and Chandra are no longer suspects in the case.

The post Johan Budi: AGO Should Drop Bambang Widjojanto Case appeared first on The Jakarta Globe.

Jakarta. Regional Representatives Council member I Gede Pasek Suardika has said his willingness to become Democratic Party chairman, supplanting incumbent chairman and former president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, is because the latter had been a poor party leader.

“SBY has succeeded in [leading] the government but has failed when managing the party,” Pasek said outside the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) headquarters in South Jakarta on Thursday. “His capability is as a leader of the government but not as manager of the party.”

Pasek added that the former president had become out of touch with the party grass roots and that a fresh pair of legs was need to revive the fortunes of the once-powerful Democrats.

He added that his position was not adversarial against Yudhoyono.

The former Indonesian president, who is the Democratic Party’s most senior figure, took over the chairmanship in late March last year, from graft convict Anas Urbaningrum. Yudhoyono’s term comes to an end in May 2015.

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