Amnesty: The State Lacks Legitimacy to Determine Activists' Status
Amnesty International Indonesia has asserted that the state lacks both moral and legal legitimacy to determine who may be called a human rights or HAM activist. This statement responds to the government’s plan to form an advisory team to determine the status of human rights defenders.
Deputy Director of Amnesty International Indonesia, Wirya Adiwena, views the plan as a regressive, dangerous step that harms the basic principles of human rights. “When the government unilaterally takes over this authority, what occurs is not protection, but domination and monopolisation of civil space,” said Wirya in a written statement on Thursday, 30 April 2026.
Wirya explained that the status of a human rights defender is inherent in an individual’s actions and commitments, not in administrative validation from the government. For him, the state’s obligation is to protect human rights defenders, not to label or revoke their status.
It is known that the Ministry of Human Rights is preparing an advisory team to ensure that legal protection is only given to those who truly carry out the function of human rights defenders. Minister of Human Rights Natalius Pigai, in an exclusive interview with the Antara news agency in Jakarta, said the advisory team would determine an activist’s status.
Pigai stated that the mechanism is designed to filter activist claims while preventing the misuse of status in legal processes. He explained that the assessment is based on strict criteria evaluating the context of an individual’s actions at the time of the incident, not merely self-proclaimed status or recognition.
“So, it could be that a human rights activist, at a certain time the advisory team finds that he is working, even though his status is as a human rights activist, at the time he is working for payment, that cannot be a human rights activist,” said Pigai in Jakarta on Wednesday, 29 April 2026, quoted from Antara.
According to Pigai, protection is only given to those defending public interests, especially vulnerable groups, without personal or commercial interests.
In response to Pigai’s plan, Wirya Adiwena emphasised that such policies lack a clear legal basis as they fundamentally contradict international standards, particularly the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights Defenders.
The declaration, Wirya revealed, explicitly states that anyone has the right to be a human rights defender as long as they oppose human rights violations through peaceful means.
Furthermore, he also assessed that Minister Pigai has disqualified individuals working professionally as human rights defenders merely because they receive payment. Wirya stated that such an understanding is narrow and misleading.
He reminded that journalists, advocates, environmental activists, victim companions, and legal aid workers who work professionally can still act as human rights defenders. “This professional work does not erase the legitimacy of their human rights work,” said Wirya.
Wirya opined that Minister Pigai’s plan for the advisory team resembles the spirit of the screening or special research (litsus) programme from the New Order era, which aimed to select citizens not aligned with the rulers’ interests.
Making the state the determinant of the validity of human rights activists’ status, Wirya said, also sets a bad precedent for human rights protection in Indonesia. “If implemented, this advisory team will certainly become a tool of administrative repression,” he said.
Wirya stated that instead of creating restrictive policies that shackle human rights defenders, the Ministry of Human Rights should focus on root problems. For him, the Ministry should stop human rights violations by state apparatus, ensure accountability, and guarantee safe space for every citizen to speak, assemble, and monitor government operations.