NewGraft arrest of Indonesia's Lamborghini-owning woman governor a dramatic blow to ruling party
Official joins more than half of Indonesia’s 539 local leaders who are currently facing corruption investigations
Indonesia’s first female governor, smiling broadly, looks down from billboards that line the potholed roads of Banten, the country’s fifth-most populous province that she has ruled for almost a decade.
Except she’s not actually there. Ratu Atut Chosiyah, 51, is in jail in the capital, Jakarta, 90 kilometres away, facing charges of bribery and extortion.
After years of support from national politicians, Islamic clerics and jawara (street gangsters reputed to have magical powers), Chosiyah’s empire is crumbling, the latest in a series of scandals weighing on Indonesia’s ruling coalition ahead of parliamentary and presidential elections.
Graft scandals have dramatically eroded for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and his Democratic Party-led alliance in the country that has the world’s biggest population of Muslims and is Southeast Asia’s largest economy.
The scandals, accompanied by rising prices and a slowdown in growth, have opened up support for the main opposition PDI-P party of former president Megawati Sukarnoputri, who lost Indonesia’s first direct presidential poll to Yudhoyono in 2004.
“For us, Banten is one of the most important provinces because it’s one of the biggest provinces in Indonesia,” said Hasto Kristianto, vice secretary-general of PDI-P, which several polls predict will come out on top in April’s general election. They also show it is now the front runner in Banten.