Equal justice for all

Equal justice for all

This has been a memorable week indeed for those who aspire to see the principle of equal justice for all upheld in Indonesia.

Only a day after the Jakarta State Administrative Court declared the government's revocation of the publishing license of the weekly news magazine Tempo unlawful, the Supreme Court acquitted nine people convicted of the 1993 slaying of labor activist Marsinah in Surabaya. The Supreme Court said on Thursday that charges of complicity had not been proven.

All the defendants involved in the Marsinah murder case have now been released from correctional institutions in and around Surabaya. The only person found guilty was Army Capt. Khusaeri, the former commander of the Porong military area, who was convicted to nine months imprisonment in 1993 by a Surabaya military tribunal for not reporting his knowledge of the impending murder. He has since been released after serving his sentence.

Logically, the Supreme Court's ruling to acquit the defendants was only a matter of course. The main defendant in the case, Judi Susanto -- the director of the watchmaking company where Marsinah was employed and who allegedly masterminded the labor activist's murder -- was exonerated by the East Java High Court in November last year for lack of proof. Nevertheless, the Supreme Court's ruling on what has become one of the biggest causes celebres in Indonesia in recent years gives reason for hope.

As was widely reported at the time, the badly mutilated body of Marsinah was found in May 1993 in the bushes at the edge of a forest near Nganjuk, East Java. A worker at the PT Catur Putra Surya in Surabaya, Marsinah was known as a tenacious labor activist who was said to be leading a protest against the company's management over the dismissal of a number of laborers.

Considering the troubled relations that existed between the workers and the management, the investigating authorities pinned their suspicions on the company's owner and executives. Judi was tried and subsequently convicted to 17 years imprisonment, but the East Java High Court overturned the verdict for lack of evidence and ordered him released. But, to everyone's surprise, the same East Java High Court upheld the convictions of the eight alleged accomplices. Their cases were referred to the Supreme Court.

With the latest ruling, one of the oddest cases in Indonesia's legal history seems to have come to a favorable end.

Now the obvious question is: If they didn't commit the crime, who did? In attempting to answer this question, the assurance given by East Java Military Commander Maj. Gen. Imam Utomo that the East Java authorities would help the police find the guilty deserves to be commended. Hopefully, justice can be done.

There is surely reason to be encouraged by these developments. Of course, some doubts are difficult to erase. Recall, for example, the Irian Jaya case where a court ruling in favor of a tribal leader was upset by a letter from the chief justice of the Supreme Court.

There is no reason why, provided that the political will is there, the principle of equal justice for all cannot be upheld in Indonesia within a reasonable time span. After all, the prevalence of a sense of security is a main requirement for true progress.