Bakrie-Rothschild: Power Struggle between Enemies

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Directors of Berau Coal Energy don’t have as much power to manage the company as they used to. The executives’ room for movement has been limited by Berau’s parent company, Bumi Plc, which controls 84.7 percent of the coal mine company's shares.

The board of directors can only make decisions on corporate actions with a value of less than US$1 million. Anything more must be approved by the board of commissioners. "Much of the authority is now in the hands of the commissioners," Berau Director Eko Budi Santoso said after a shareholders meeting two weeks ago at Hotel Le Meridien, Jakarta. "Just in case there is a recurrence of what happened recently."

Indeed, Berau is mired in trouble. The old management under Rosan Perkasa Roeslani is considered to have made a mistake that cost the company nearly US$2 trillion last year. An investigative audit found financial irregularities to the tune of US$201 million, or Rp 1.99 trillion, in 2011 and 2012.

Rosan was subsequently asked to pay Berau US$173 million. "There was no penalty. I will help Berau immediately," Rosan said last June. He was removed in March and then became president of Recapital, one of Berau’s shareholders.

A Tempo source from Bumi Plc said the commissioners had been granted increased authority due to irregularities in Berau’s financial statements. "It alerted Bumi Plc to the need for closer supervision," the source said on Wednesday last week. The boards of directors and commissioners were revamped to achieve that purpose.

At the end of June, Sandiaga Uno, Rosan’s partner in Recapital, resigned from the board of commissioners. Bumi CEO Nick Von Schrinding was brought in as deputy commissioner to accompany President Commissioner Sofyan Djalil and commissioner Amir Sambodo. Amir is also an independent director of Bumi Plc.

Nick, Amir and Rosan were part of the Bakrie group who successfully thwarted baron Nathaniel Rothchild’s desire to retain Bumi Resources in Bumi Plc. Rothschild controls 17.8 percent of Bumi Plc. The other shareholders include Borneo Lumbung Energi & Metal owned by Samin Tan (23.8 percent), the Bakrie Group (23.8 percent), Hary Tanoesoedibjo (1.7 percent) and Hashim Djojohadikusomo.

Results of the voting at Bumi Plc’s general meeting in London in February showed Bakrie had 63 percent support. Bakrie returned to full control of Bumi Resources by buying 29 percent of Bumi Plc shares in the largest coal mining company. Nat also failed to kick 12 of the total 14 members out of the board of directors of Bumi Plc.

Bakrie and Nat, who joined forces to found Bumi Plc, are now sworn enemies. According to the source mentioned above, the revamp is also to protect Berau from Rothschild’s obsession to control mining assets in Indonesia. With Bumi Resources gone, Berau has automatically become the British investor’s main target.

Rothschild denied he was after Berau. He said he was only trying to protect the company from suffering further losses at Bakrie’s hands. He is doubtful the revamp will be able to fix Berau. "Berau is still under the control of Bakrie and Samin Tan’s allies," he told Tempo via email on Monday.

Rothschild said the reshuffle was only to accommodate Bakrie’s allies, such as Scott Merrillees and Eko in the board of directors and Nick and Amir in the board of commissioners. "This is not a shareholder dispute as Bakrie claimed, but an old-style fraud," Rothschild said.

Bakrie Group spokesman Christopher Fong denied his boss wanted to rock the Berau boat. "Our interests are only in Bumi Plc. Nat was just spouting nonsense," he said.

GUSTIDHA BUDIARTIE, RIZKI PUSPITA SARI