Battle of narrow interests may hinder amendment process

A'an Suryana and Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Many fear that the ongoing constitutional amendment in the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) may eventually fail to harvest an ideal constitution if its process is plagued by a battle of narrow interests among legislators.

"How can we expect much from the legislators, if their existence itself depends heavily on the contents of the Constitution (to be amended)? This is a serious problem," Rachman Tolleng, a former student activist and nationalist, said on Thursday.

Rachman, who is also from the Democracy Forum, told The Jakarta Post that the establishment of an independent constitutional commission was the best alternative to avoid total failure in the amendment of the 1945 Constitution.

Rachman expressed concern over the legislators of the MPR's ad-hoc commission in charge of the revision of the Constitution, who were absorbed in a struggle for their own interests within the amendment process.

Some groups, including those in the functional groups and the military and police faction, were struggling to maintain their existence at the MPR. In the draft amendment, their faction will not exist under the new constitution.

His statement refers to a plan to end the presence of the functional groups and the military and police faction in the MPR.

Almost six months after the MPR was given the go-ahead to amend the constitution, only six of the 18 targeted articles have been deliberated by the commission. With only four months before MPR's annual session in August during which the amendments were expected to be endorsed, there is a growing suspicion that the MPR is not serious about the amendment.

Besides fighting for survival in the MPR, some legislators had also been accused of pursuing their own ideological agenda in the deliberation on the amendment, said nationalist Rachmawati Soekarnoputri on a separate occasion.

"Some groups, for example, are pushing ahead for the reinclusion of the Jakarta Charter with others insisting on the imposition of radical regional autonomy regulations, which will be a threat to the unitary state of Indonesia," Rachmawati, the chairwoman of the nationalist grouping Forum National, told a press conference at Bung Karno University (UBK) here.

The reinclusion of the Jakarta Charter, which had been dropped from the Constitution in 1945, has become a contentious issue. Some right wing Muslims have pushed for its inclusion as a means to promote the implementation of syariah (Islamic law) in Indonesia.

Those groups include the United Development Party (PPP), whose legislators hold a significant number of seats in the MPR.

The nationalists and minority groupings have strongly rejected the reinclusion of the Jakarta Charter.

The regional autonomy drive has also been opposed by nationalists for fear that it may cause the disintegration of the nation.

According to Rachman, such a battle of interests would prevent the formation of the best constitution in the future.

"Therefore, an independent constitutional commission must eventually be established to avoid such conflict among the legislators," said Rachman, who had a significant role in the student movement during Soeharto's early years in the 1970s.

Rachmawati said that the battle of interests had provided strong justification for the amendment process to be halted.

"Learning from the history, the battle of the interests would end up in a deadlock, and this would later create a constitutional crisis as had occurred in the late 1950s," said Rachmawati, a daughter of president Sukarno.

Following the failure of the parliament to create a new constitution, Sukarno was forced to issue a presidential decree in 1959 that the country had to refer back to the 1945 Constitution.