Court rejects 'Tempo' lawsuit for compensation

Court rejects 'Tempo' lawsuit for compensation

JAKARTA (JP): The Central Jakarta District Court dismissed
yesterday a damages claim brought against Information Minister
Harmoko by former employees of the banned Tempo newsweekly.

The decision dampened the workers' jubilation over their
victory in a related action against the minister in the Jakarta
State Administrative Court last week.

The district court dismissed the compensation claim, filed
separately by the former employees of Tempo, on the ground that
it had no jurisdiction to hear the action.

"A general court has no jurisdiction to decide this case,"
Judge Leo Hutagalung said in delivering his judgment. He said the
case properly fell within the jurisdiction of the State
Administrative Court.

The half-hour court sitting was attended by lawyer Rita Serena
Kolibonso on behalf of the 39 former employees of the outlawed
news magazine.

Hutagalung said the case should be heard by an administrative
court because the suit arose from a ministerial decree. Minister
Harmoko banned Tempo in a decree last June, citing unacceptable
editorial content.

In his reasons for deciding, Hutagalung said that because
administrative courts cannot hear damages cases in which the
amount claimed exceeded Rp 5 million (about US$ 2,245), the
action should be dropped altogether.

The former employees of the popular weekly filed a suit
against Information Minister Harmoko in November, seeking damages
in the sum of Rp 936 million (about US$420,000) in respect of two
years' loss of income.

The plaintiffs also sought an order that the minister make a
formal apology for causing them to become unemployed. Before
being banned, Tempo was Indonesia's best-selling magazine, with a
circulation of about 180,000.

After hearing the court's decision Rita said her clients might
appeal the decision or commence a new action.

The decision came after a landmark court victory last week in
which the State Administrative Court overturned the ban on Tempo,
citing inadequacies in the ministerial decree which rendered it
void in law.

Harmoko promptly declared that he would appeal the
administrative court's decision and that he had appointed the
Attorney General to represent him.

Legal expert Harkristuti Harkrisnowo said there were several
avenues that Rita and the Tempo employees could pursue, but added
that the highly political nature of the case might eventually
thwart their efforts.

The staff lecturer at the University of Indonesia's Law School
told The Jakarta Post that Rita could either reframe the suit so
that individual employees each demanded compensation of less than
Rp 5 million, or appeal the district court's decision.

"I believe this glitch concerned procedural issues,"
Harkristuti said. "The administrative court's ruling is not yet
final, so the employees do not have the benefit of any
established legal precedent regarding the case."

"That's probably why the Central Jakarta district court
refused to hear the compensation claim," she said. "The lawsuit
against Harmoko, which the former employees won last week, could
fail in a higher court."

Harkristuti said that both Goenawan Mohamad, Tempo's former
chief editor, and the other employees should have included their
compensation claim in their actions against the ban.

But the administrative's court limit of Rp 5 million made this
difficult, she said. "The only option left to them is to file for
compensation on an individual basis, rather than collectively,"
she said.

She warned that, even if the court agreed to hear the
compensation case or the former employees decided to pursue it in
the administrative court, unpredictable elements might intervene.

"This is a political issue...Even if those former employees
win the cases, there's no guarantee that they will eventually get
their money," she said. "This is very problematical."

Regarding the administrative court decision, Harkristuti said
she had no way of predicting the outcome. "Anything could
happen...Even if the case is won in the Supreme Court, the
decision could still be nullified," she said.

"I know this doesn't make sense, but we have to admit that
sometimes there are no rules about the law," she said. "So, I
suggest that the Tempo employees check their jubilation now,
because nothing's final yet."

"They're in for a very long journey," she said. However, "for
the situation as a whole, this development is quite encouraging
because we can see that the judicial branch of power has started
to exert its muscle in the face of the executive power." (swe)