TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Police claim that they have collected leads on men who allegedly attacked the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) senior investigator Novel Baswedan on Tuesday, April 11, 2017. Jakarta Metro Police chief Insp. Gen. Muhammad Iriawan said that police have gathered the pictures of individuals who have allegedly stalked Novel of late.
“We will examine their correlation with the attacker,” he said in his office on Wednesday, April 12.
Iriawan said that the pictures of unidentified men were collected from Novel who had suspected that he had been followed since two weeks ago. The pictures had been shown to at least 15 witnesses to identify the stalker and match them with the profile of the perpetrator of the acid attack against Novel. The police team has also tested the type of hydrochloric acid laced in a can found near the scene allegedly used by the perpetrators.
Read: KPK Intensifies Security Following Attack on Novel Baswedan
A source revealed that Novel had complained about being followed by mysterious men in the past few days. Therefore, he always took different paths towards his office and back home. He had also installed CCTVs in his house in Kelapa Gading, North Jakarta.
The CCTVs did not record the attack that took place 15 meters from Novel’s home. They, however, recorded two men riding a motorcycle passing by Novel’s house from different direction half an hour before the incident.
Neighbors said that mysterious men were often seen in the neighborhood. They used to ride a motorcycle and sit in the compound of Al-Ihsan Mosque near Novel’s house.
Read: KPK Investigators Being Targeted with Terror Acts
A stalker had a tall and lean body, whereas the other one was short and fat. “I’ve seen them before, around two months ago,” a neighbor said. Al-Ihsan Mosque imam Abdur Rahim Hasan believed that the perpetrator with the same profile attacked Novel after the early morning prayer last Tuesday. “Before the incident, I saw the fat man peeing,” Hasan said.
Former KPK chief Busyro Muqoddas has urged President Joko Widodo alias Jokowi to form an independent fact-finding team to investigate the actors behind the act of terror.
KPK workers union and the Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) have urged Jokowi to form an independent team. “The information about the attack are aplenty. Will police department crack down on the case?” Haris Azhar of Kontras said. “If there is no such intention, it’s better to form an independent team. The terror case must be addressed.”
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