1. NU: 12 x 4 lines
1. NU: 12 x 4 lines
NU seeks to reunite scattered members
Nahdlatul Ulama (NU), the nation's largest Muslim organization,
opened on Thursday a national conference aimed at reuniting its
fragmented politicians and ulemas scattered throughout different
parties and social groups.
The three-day meeting, held at Jakarta's haj pilgrim dormitory
complex in Pondok Gede, was expected to recommend the
establishment of an NU political commission at the national and
regional levels to achieve its goals and strengthen the political
role of its members.
"Through this meeting we want to reunite the NU figures
scattered everywhere and reposition its national role," NU
chairman Hasyim Muzadi said in his speech.
2. TKW: 34 x 2 lines
'Stop sending female workers to Middle East'
State Minister of Women's Empowerment Sri Redjeki Sumaryoto has
strongly urged the government to stop supplying women workers to
Middle Eastern countries as they are still treating Indonesian
women employed as domestic helpers in the region as slaves.
"Such treatment amounts to abuse and therefore, a serious
effort is needed to ensure that Indonesian women working in Saudi
Arabia and other Middle Eastern countries are treated humanely,"
the minister said in the West Nusa Tenggara provincial capital of
Mataram on Thursday.
She said she had delivered a letter to Minister of Manpower
and Transmigration Jacob Nuwa Wea to stop temporarily the
dispatch of women workers to the Gulf countries until they
revised their rules to provide for protection of foreign workers.
3. MPR: 43 x 1 line
Analyst warns of public apathy toward MPR Annual Session
A political analyst warned on Thursday that the public could
prove to be apathetic toward the upcoming Annual Session of the
People's Consultative Assembly (MPR), saying bribery among
politicians would erode the credibility of the session's outcome.
Political analyst Indria Samego of the Center for Information
and Development Studies (Cides) said the public had become used
to widespread corruption among the political elite.
But when asked what the public could do to help make MPR
members accountable, Indria replied: "Not much".
"People are tired of politics, they're apathetic, they
probably think the entire process (of democracy) just cannot be
made to move faster," he said after a discussion on political and
economic conditions ahead of the MPR Annual Session, slated for
next month.
4. HDI: 38 x 1 line
People's poor welfare blamed on small budget allocation
The small budgetary allocation for health, education and social
welfare expenditure was a major factor that rendered Indonesia
one of the countries least successful in improving the welfare of
its people, population experts said on Thursday.
Chairman of the Indonesian Legislative Forum on Population and
Development Surya Chandra Surapaty said social spending had yet
to enter the mainstream in the budget at either national or
provincial level.
"Meanwhile, the education sector should receive 20 percent of
the development budget and the health sector some 15 percent. At
present we receive only 5 percent for each," he told The Jakarta
Post.
5. LEGAL: 48 x 1 line
Don't hire disreputable lawyers say attorneys
Who contributes the most to the corrupt judiciary in the country?
Are they the prosecutors, lawyers or judges?
"All do, including the public and businesspeople who persist
to win legal case by buying the justice," noted lawyer Frans
Hendra Winarta said on Thursday.
Frans, also a member of the National Commission on Law
Development (KHN), was addressing a workshop on the benchmark of
the recruitment of prosecutors, judges and advocates co-organized
by the KHN and the Yogyakarta-based legal watchdog, the
Indonesian Court Monitoring.
Human rights lawyer Todung Mulya Lubis, who shared the same
table with Frans in the workshop, asked the public not to hire
"disgraceful lawyers", who he described as those violating the
lawyers' moral ethic by guaranteeing victory to their clients and
having enjoyed "luxurious" life in their early career as lawyers.