Bumi accused of evading tax

Mochammad Tjiptardjo, the nation?s tax chief, revealed on Friday that Bakrie coal miner PT Bumi Resources and two of its units owed the government Rp 2 trillion (1US$ = Rp 9,400) ) in taxes, The Jakarta Globe reported Saturday.

Tjiptardjo said Bumi and PT Kaltim Prima Coal had been ?under investigation? since March for possible tax evasion in 2007.

Meanwhile, the office had recently opened a probe of PT Arutmin Indonesia for similar irregularities, he said.

?We are working professionally here, separate from politics. I had started handling these taxpayers? [cases] before the noise even started,? he said.

Dileep Srivastava, Bumi?s head of investor relations, declined to speak on the matter.

Tjiptardjo said lawyers of two of the three miners had attempted to settle the issue by paying about Rp 1 trillion. He said the tax office had become suspicious earlier this year after realizing the companies had submitted incorrect tax declaration letters (SPT) for 2007.

But Tjiptardjo said the attempts to settle the case were not the proper way to get out of a government tax probe.

?The procedure is like this; they must pay their taxes and a 400 percent penalty, then they have to ask the finance minister to call off the investigation,? he said. ?The point is that they have to admit their fault.?

With the penalty factored in, the three companies would have to pay as much as Rp 10 trillion.

Despite reported friction between Sri Mulyani and Bakrie group patriarch Aburizal Bakrie, Tjiptardjo denied that the investigation was politically driven. (*)