The Attorney General's Office (AGO) has completed a search at the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources' Directorate General of Oil and Gas (Ditjen Migas). The search was conducted across three rooms.
"The search took place in three rooms: first, the director's office for upstream business development; second, the director's office for downstream business development; and third, the office of the secretary of the Directorate General of Oil and Gas," said Harli Siregar, Head of Public Relations at the Attorney General's Office, to reporters on Monday, February 10, 2025.
"During the search, investigators from the Directorate of Investigation at the Special Crimes Directorate (Jampidsus) found five boxes of documents, 15 mobile phones, one laptop, and empty soft files," he added.
Harli explained that the search is part of an investigation into a suspected corruption case related to the management of crude oil and refinery products at PT Pertamina (Persero), its sub-holdings, and contractor work agreements between 2018 and 2023.
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The case stems from the government’s issuance of Ministerial Regulation (Permen) ESDM No. 42/2018, which prioritizes domestic crude oil to meet national demand.
"The regulation mandates PT Pertamina to source domestically produced crude oil to fulfill national needs and those of private Production Sharing Contractors (KKKS)," Harli said.
Under this policy, the crude oil owned by private KKKS must first be offered to PT Pertamina (Persero). However, if Pertamina rejects the offer, the private KKKS may use the rejection to apply for an export recommendation.
In practice, Pertamina’s refinery sub-holding, PT Kilang Pertamina Internasional (PT KPI), is suspected of attempting to bypass this agreement.
"In practice, private KKKS and Pertamina—specifically ISC and/or PT KPI—tried to avoid the agreement in various ways when offering crude oil," he said.
Additionally, during this period, state-owned crude oil and condensate (MMKBN) were exported due to reduced refinery intake capacity, allegedly justified by the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, Pertamina continued to import crude oil to meet refinery intake needs.
"The export of MMKBN led to domestically processable crude oil being replaced by imported crude oil. This has become a recurring practice by PT Pertamina, which continues to rely on crude oil imports," Harli concluded.
In response, the Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources (ESDM) expressed its respect for the legal processes being conducted in accordance with applicable regulations following the AGO's visit to the Directorate General of Oil and Gas.
The ministry’s Bureau of Communications, Public Information Services, and Cooperation emphasized that the ministry fully respects the actions taken by law enforcement authorities and remains committed to cooperation, all while upholding the presumption of innocence.
Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak
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