A Broker Named Irman Gusman

Irman Gusman is now officially a broker. He peddled his influence as a public official in exchange for monetary gain. Irman, who is chairman of the Regional Representative Council (DPD) was caught red-handed taking a Rp100 million bribe from Xaveriandy Sutanto, a sugar baron and the owner of Semesta Berjaya company, along with his wife Memi, at their official residence around midnight last Saturday.

As the DPD leader, Irman has no authority over sugar import matters so it came as a surprise to many that he received a guest who already was in trouble with the law in his private home at such odd hours. Xaveriandy is a defendant in a non-SNI (Indonesian National Standard) sugar import case currently on trial at the Padang District Court in West Sumatra. For sure, there is no connection between Irman and that particular case. The bribe was for something else, possibly to influence State Logistics Agency (Bulog) to grant Semesta Berjaya an additional sugar quota for West Sumatra.