Assembly reaches conclusion on human rights protection

JAKARTA (JP): The Special Session of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) reached a smooth conclusion on Thursday in its deliberations of human rights protection.

Members of Commission E in charge of debating the issue agreed that rights protection should be set out in an MPR ruling.

The motion was initiated by the United Development Party (PPP) and won the support of all the other factions.

PPP, along with the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI), had originally campaigned for the subject to be included in the General Session of the MPR in March, but the ruling Golkar and Armed Forces (ABRI) factions rejected the idea.

The document stipulates that all state institutions respect and uphold human rights and that the president and the House of Representatives ratify United Nations covenants on human rights.

Indonesia has yet to ratify, a number of codes, including the 1966 UN covenant on social and political rights.

Slamet Effendy Yusuf of Golkar led the deliberations during which it was decided to add a chapter to the draft decree, on people's right to information.

The Commission also agreed to revoke the 1978 Assembly decree on the Propagation and Implementation of Pancasila (P4).

Fahri Hamzah of the United Development Party told The Jakarta Post that the Commission unanimously decided to lift the 20-year decree in its meeting.

"We agreed to lift P4 but at the same time asserted that Pancasila remain the state ideology," Fahri, who is one of the Commission's formulation team members, said after completing the sub-commission meeting.

During Soeharto's New Order regime, P4 was a compulsory program for students, government officials and private-sector workers.

Critics, however, have said the propagation programs were not effective in raising people's awareness of the state ideology.

"We had quite an intensive discussion on whether or not P4 should be lifted, but finally we managed to reach an agreement," Fahri said.

He added that the ABRI faction expressed concern during the discussions that the abolition of P4 would completely wipe away the people's awareness of the state ideology.

But, Fahri said, the ABRI faction was then assured by the other factions that Pancasila would remain the state ideology.

"Therefore, we made an additional clause in the draft decree that stipulates Pancasila will remain the state ideology," Fahri said.

He added that the result of the meeting would be brought before the plenary session on Friday to be adopted as a decree. (byg)