(Sept 17): Indonesia’s Finance Ministry is reviewing a surprise reshuffle of hundreds of staff that former minister Purbaya Yudhi Sadewa said helped trigger his dismissal.

The ministry will review the recent rotations after considering input from various department heads, newly appointed Finance Minister Suahasil Nazara told reporters late Wednesday after meeting with President Prabowo Subianto in Jakarta. 

“We will make sure that there is good coordination and synergy within the Finance Ministry,” he said.

Purbaya last week rotated at least 400 staff across various departments, including large numbers of employees in the ministry’s tax and customs offices, angering their leaders and causing confusion, according to people familiar with the situation. He later said the rotations “partly” contributed to his ouster as minister on Monday.

At the tax office, some names had been “magically” added to the rotation list despite not having gone through the proper selection process, Tax Director-General Bimo Wijayanto said on the sidelines of a conference in Jakarta on Wednesday, local media reported. 

Wijayanto said he and the director general of customs had asked that the planned rotations be delayed or cancelled after finding indications that some names had bypassed the selection process, warning that proceeding could send a bad signal to staff who had gone through assessments.

Any tax office rotations that had not followed proper procedures would be cancelled, he said.

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