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Indonesia's Supreme Court has overturned a lower court's acquittal of three major palm oil groups in a corruption case linked to crude palm oil (CPO) export licences, reinstating their criminal liability and ordering them to pay trillions of rupiah in fines and compensation.
In a ruling handed down on 15 September, the court found palm oil companies Wilmar Group, Permata Hijau Group and Musim Mas Group guilty of corruption in obtaining licences to export crude palm oil and its derivatives in 2022, a year marked by export restrictions on such products due to a domestic cooking oil shortage.
The Attorney General's Office (AGO) had suspected the three companies of violating a temporary export ban imposed by then-President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo's administration to stabilise domestic prices during the peak of the country's cooking oil crisis.
Investigators alleged that the illegal exports cost the state around 18 trillion rupiah (US$1.07 billion), as the government was forced to heavily subsidise domestic cooking oil prices to ease the crisis.
Prosecutors at the AGO had asked the Jakarta Corruption Court to convict the three companies of corruption and order each to pay a fine of 1 billion rupiah, along with an additional compensation payment ranging from 900 billion to 11 trillion rupiah to offset state losses. However, the three judges presiding over the case — Agam Syarief Baharudin, Ali Muhtarom and Djuyamto — acquitted the companies of all charges.
Prosecutors subsequently appealed the acquittal to the Supreme Court after the judges were arrested in April on suspicion of receiving at least 60 billion rupiah in bribes to secure a favourable ruling for the companies.
"The Attorney General's appeal has been granted," the judges wrote in a copy of their appeal ruling published on the Supreme Court's website on Thursday (25 September). The judges ordered the three companies to each pay a fine of 1 billion rupiah.
The companies were also ordered to pay varying amounts in compensation: Wilmar was ordered to pay 11.8 trillion rupiah, while Permata Hijau and Musim Mas were ordered to pay 937 billion rupiah and 4.8 trillion rupiah respectively.
In June, Wilmar paid 11.8 trillion rupiah to the AGO, which was later reported to be the largest sum ever seized by a law enforcement agency in a corruption case. The funds came from the Wilmar Respondents, five companies operating under the group: Multimas Nabati Asahan, Multi Nabati Sulawesi, Sinar Alam Permai, Wilmar Bioenergi Indonesia and Wilmar Nabati Indonesia.
The AGO said at the time that the funds would be included in the evidence list for the Supreme Court appeal, adding that prosecutors would seek their forfeiture as a means of "compensating for state losses caused by the defendant [Wilmar]".
In their ruling, the Supreme Court judges ordered the AGO to seize the funds as compensation and transfer them to the state treasury. Singapore-based Wilmar has maintained its position that its actions were within legal bounds.
"While Wilmar respects the decision of the Indonesian Supreme Court, it maintains that the actions taken by the Wilmar Respondents, during the period of cooking oil shortages in the Indonesian market, were carried out in compliance with applicable regulations and in good faith," the company said in a statement on Thursday.
The three judges, along with former Central Jakarta District Court deputy chief judge Muhammad Arif Nuryanta, remain on trial for their alleged crimes. Arif, who was serving as deputy chief judge when the Wilmar trial began in early 2024, is alleged to have received 60 billion rupiah in bribes from lawyers representing the palm oil companies in exchange for a favourable ruling. He is alleged to have shared the funds with Agam, Ali and Djuyamto, the three judges who presided over the case.
Judge Djuyamto is alleged to have received 6 billion rupiah, Ali 5 billion rupiah, and Agam 4.5 billion rupiah. Also arrested in the case were former Central Jakarta District Court clerk Wahyu Gunawan, who allegedly liaised with the lawyers over the bribes; Wilmar Group's head of social security legal affairs Muhammad Syafei, who is suspected of providing the bribe money; and lawyers Marcella Santoso and Ariyanto Bakri.
Source: The Jakarta Post