Is where the Mum and daughter ate ?
Corruption watchdog seeks
probe into Buddha Bar
Prodita Sabarini, THE JAKARTA POST, JAKARTA | Jakarta | Wed, March 18 2009,
The Indonesian Corruption Watch head of Monitoring and Investigation Agus Sunaryanto said that, the religious issue aside, the public should question the dodgy circumstances behind the transformation of the 96-year-old Old Dutch building into a high-class restaurant.
The building, once owned and abandoned by the son of former president Suharto, Hutomo Mandala Putra, was repurchased by the city administration for Rp 28.9 billion in 2001. The city poured another Rp 6.1 billion in to repair it.
Buddha Bar is now jointly run by Renny Sutiyoso, the daughter of former governor Sutiyoso, who approved the restoration of the building, and the daughter of former president Megawati, Puan Maharani. The management of the bar rented the building for Rp 4 billion for five years.
“When we found out that Renny Sutiyoso was one of the owners, we were concerned that there had been a conflict of interest here. It is an asset of the city administration. There was a huge budget spent on the restoration and now the building is used by the private sector, in which the daughter of the former governor is involved,” Agus said.
“We hope that law enforcers have the initiative to investigate this.”
Buddha Bar manager Herry Prasetya refused to comment, saying that he was only responsible for the running of the restaurant.
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2009/03/18/corruption-watchdog-seeks-probe-buddha-bar.html
Asia's first Buddha Bar under attack in Indonesia AFP, March 22, 2009
Having aggravated the country's Buddhist minority, the bar is also caught up calls from anti-corruption activists for a probe into alleged conflicts of interest and abuse of power.
Suspicions are swirling around millions of dollars in public money that was spent renovating the old immigration building before it was offered by the city council for commercial lease.
The bar is co-owned by the wealthy daughters of former president Megawati Sukarnoputri and the ex-governor of Jakarta, Sutiyoso, who reportedly ordered the renovations.
"There could be a conflict of interest. Officials need to investigate whether their permits and documents are in line with procedure," Indonesian Corruption Watch coordinator Agus Sunaryanto said.
"The Jakarta administration allocated 30 billion rupiah (2.52 million dollars) to renovate the historic building. Initially, the renovation fund was one billion rupiah but the administration decided to allocate more."
The daughters and the bar's managers have refused to comment, but French entrepreneur Raymond Visan, whose George V Eatertainment group is the Buddha Bar's parent company, says the Jakarta franchise has done nothing wrong.
The bar is being caught up in local politics ahead of elections in April and July, he said.
http://www.buddhistchannel.tv/index.php?id=58,7930,0,0,1,0#.Usoa0vQW2aw
