REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA - Outspoken minister for state enterprises Dahlan Iskan has been warned to be more cautious in making statements without backing with facts. Recently he triggered uproar by saying lawmakers seeking to extort money from state companies. 

Dahlan has been quoted as accusing around ten unnamed lawmakers of seeking to extort money from state companies when discussing budget for the companies. His statements had put him on the headlines over the past weeks with lawmakers accusing him of seeking to draw public attention ahead of the presidential elections in 2014. Dahlan has been said to be a potential presidential candidate with his reputation as a clean man.

Today he said he gave only two names of the lawmakers he accused of being extorters to the Honorary Board of the Parliament. Yet, to journalists he refused to give the names.

"I never said ten lawmakers but I only said around ten lawmakers," he told reporters after bringing his allegation to the Parliament Honorary Board. 

Deputy House Speaker Priyo Budisantoso from the Golkar Party, said the minister should have restrained from issuing statements without backing with facts. Otherwise, he will create new destabilizing problem. 

"As a state official, Dahlan must have been careful as statement could give different resonance," Priyo said.

Priyo said Dahlan`s statement would damage relation between the Parliament and the president as it was said that the president knew and approved the moves taken by Dahlan. He said he had not received report from the Honorary Board of the Parliament about the meeting with Dahlan earlier in the day. 

However, he said information he received that what Dahlan had reported was not as "tremendous as widely reported that has put him on the spotlight in the past several days."

"From the beginning I has been on his side to divulge the names of all extorters from any institutions including from the ministries or the Palace, but it turned out to be just like that," he said then added that Dahlan could have done better by reporting the case to police or the Corruption Eradication Commission.

Observers, however, tend to believe what Dahlan has said, but they are aware it is difficult to produce hard evidence to back up the allegation. It had been a public knowledge that state companies have long become cash cows for politicians, they said.

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