House to deliberate 53 bills, skepticism remains over its success

Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Despite its inability to meet legislation targets in past sessions, the House of Representatives opened on Monday the year's first session with promises that it would deliberate 53 bills within 38 days.

The number of bills to be deliberated is larger than in past sessions because of the accumulation of unfinished bills from past sessions.

"There are 53 bills to be deliberated by the special committee (Pansus), commissions and the legislation body (Baleg)," House Speaker Akbar Tandjung said during the opening session here on Monday.

With such bold promises of deliberating 53 bills this session, legislators seemed to have forgotten the poor discipline that contributed to their failure to finish deliberating bills in previous sessions.

But they might soon be reminded of this lack of discipline if Monday's session is a hint of things to come. Although legislators enjoyed more than a month-long recess, including the Idul Fitri, Christmas and New Year's holidays, only 256 out of 489 legislators showed up for the first plenary meeting.

Poor discipline and political bickering so far have been the main factors disrupting the deliberation of bills.

The bill on the national education system, for example, has barely been touched since October 2001. A similar fate also has befallen the bill on industrial dispute resolution, which has been with the House since June 2000.

On average, the House has finished deliberating up to only six bills every session, which last between one and two months.

Legal and political analyst Hamid Awaluddin said this sluggishness should not be blamed simply on the legislators.

"In some cases, the substance of the bills is tough and thus they require long debate. There are also numerous aspirations from the people," Hamid told The Jakarta Post on Monday night.

Hamid suggested that each political party monitor the performance of its legislators in meeting their legislation duties, and publicly announce the results of the monitoring as a form of accountability.

During Monday's session, Akbar said some of the bills were top priorities for the House because they would help promote law enforcement, propel economic growth, improve the people's welfare and develop a more democratic political system.

Among the bills scheduled for completion soon are the bill on elections, the bill on banking loans, the bill on bank liquidations, the bill on bankruptcy and the postponement of debt resettlement, the bill on the national education system, the bill on state enterprises, the bill on the procedure of legislation, the bill on manpower and the bill on the protection of workers abroad.

There are questions as to why four antiterrorism bills, which were once declared "very urgent" for combating terrorists, were not included on the House's list of top priorities.

And the bills on the composition of legislative bodies and presidential and vice presidential elections, which are crucial for the 2004 elections, also are not on the top priority list.

Akbar, who has been convicted of misusing Rp 40 billion (US$4.49 million) of State Logistics Agency (Bulog) money, demanded that legislators be sensitive to the people's aspirations during the deliberation of bills.

"If we do this, all of the bills endorsed by the House will receive the support of the entire nation," said Akbar, who remains free pending an appeal of his conviction.

House's tentative schedule for Jan. 13 - March 7, 2003

Jan. 13: First plenary meeting.

Jan. 16: Steering committee: report on regional visits, agenda for each commission.

Jan. 17: Faction's internal meeting.

Jan. 20: Plenary meeting: formation of special committees for antiterrorism bill, creation of West Sulawesi province, a class action against House by residents in Maninjau regency.

Jan. 21: Plenary meeting: proposals of bills on Constitutional Court, Judicial Commission and Ombudsman.

Jan. 30: Plenary meeting: election bill endorsement.

Feb. 11: Plenary meeting: manpower bill endorsement.

Feb. 18: Endorsement of procedures for lawmaking, report of probe into BLBI and state oil firm Pertamina.

Feb. 24: Endorsement of bills on state finances and state enterprises.

Feb. 25: Endorsement of bills on advocates and Indonesia.

March 7: Approval of Supreme Justices.