Prosecutors from Indonesia’s Attorney General’s Office Arrest and Detain Lawyers-TV News Director for “Obstructing” Investigations, Antaranews.com

By Nadia Putri Rahmani for Antaranews.com, 22 April 2025

Jakarta (ANTARA) – Indonesia’s Attorney General’s Office (Kejagung) has outlined the alleged roles of lawyer Marcella Santoso, lawyer and university professor Junaedi Saibih, and director of news at a private Jakarta television station Tian Bahtiar in what it alleges is a case of obstruction of justice.

Director of Investigations at the Deputy Attorney General for Special Crimes (Jampidsus) of Indonesia’s Attorney General’s Office, Abdul Qohar, alleged early Tuesday morning at the Attorney General’s offices in Jakarta that the conspiracy had started when suspects Santoso and Saibih had ordered the suspect Bahtiar to generate a negative narrative that placed the Attorney General’s Office in a difficult position.

The negative narrative was in relation to its handling of high profile cases of alleged corruption over tin commodity trading in the government controlled tin mining concessions (IUP) of SOE PT Timah Tbk between 2015 and 2022, alleged corruption in the administration of sugar importation licenses under then trade minister suspect Tom Lembong, and alleged corruption in the provision of crude palm oil export facilities.

Qohar claimed the negative narrative had been broadcast in a variety of forms of publication, from news reports to seminar events.

The suspect Saibih, he claimed, had created a positive narrative and opinion for his team, and created a methodology for calculating alleged government financial losses which appeared to demonstrate that the calculations presented by the Attorney General’s Office were incorrect and misleading.

The suspect Bahtiar had then transferred the narrative created by Saibih into news on a number of social media and online media, he claimed.

“(In the so-called negative narrative) the prosecutor’s office had also been portrayed in a negative way, as harming the rights of the suspects or defendants represented by (now) suspects Santoso and Saibih as the attorney’s for the various suspects or defendants,” he claimed.

Santoso and Saibih, Qohar continued, had also organized and funded seminars, podcasts, and talk shows in various online media by directing negative narratives in the news in order to influence the evidence in the different trials.

The different media activities were then covered by the suspect Bahtiar and broadcasted on Jakarta television station JAKTV and JAKTV’s official online accounts, including on TikTok and YouTube.

Qohar also claimed that Santoso and Saibih had funded demonstrations with the aim of subverting the investigation, prosecution, and proving of the three cases in court.

Bahtiar had also used the demonstrations to create negative portrayals in the news about the Prosecutor’s Office, he claimed.

“So, their goal was clearly the forming of negative opinion as if what the investigator was handling was not right, disturbing the concentration of investigators so that it was hoped, or their hope was, that the cases could be dropped or at least to disrupt the concentration of the investigation,” said Qohar emphasizing the point.

For his role, suspect Bahtir had received Rp 478,500,000 ($32,000) which had gone into his personal account, Qohar alleged.

“There had been no written contract between the JAKTV company and the parties named suspects so there was an indication suspect Bahtiar had abused his authority in his position as news director,” claimed Qohar.

The three suspects have also been indicted under Article 21 of Law 31/1999 Concerning the Eradication of Criminal Acts of Corruption as amended by Law 20/2001 Concerning the Eradication of Criminal Acts of Corruption in conjunction with Article 55 paragraph (1) 1 of Indonesia’s Criminal Code.

Pending further processing, suspects Saibih and Santoso are being detained in custody at the Attorney General Office’s section of Salemba jail for the next 20 days.

Meanwhile, suspect Santoso was not detained because she is already being held as a suspect over an alleged bribery case involving the acquittal of a crude palm oil export facility corruption case at the Central Jakarta District Court.

Reporter: Nadia Putri Rahmani
Editor: Hisar Sitanggang
Copyright © ANTARA 2025

This post is based on https://m.antaranews.com/berita/4785173/kejagung-ungkap-peran-advokat-dirpem-tv-swasta-yang-rintangi-penyidikan. Featured image credit: Former Deputy Chair of Indonesia’s Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) Saut Situmorang is embraced by Anies Baswedan after hearing  Thomas Lembong sentenced to 4.5 years in prison over alleged corruption related to sugar importation at the Central Jakarta Corruption Court, Friday (July 18, 2025). (KOMPAS.com/Xena Olivia)

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