Ministry of Law emphasises that legal reform must not be limited to paper policies alone

Jakarta (ANTARA) - Indonesia’s Ministry of Law (Kemenkum) has emphasised that legal reform must not be confined to the level of policies on paper alone, but must deliver real impacts that are directly felt by the public. The Head of the National Law Development Agency (BPHN) under Kemenkum, Min Usihen, stated that the legal reform agenda is one of the priorities in national development. “This reform is directed towards presenting better, adaptive, and principled regulatory arrangements, thereby capable of supporting government performance while improving the quality of public services,” Min explained in a statement confirmed in Jakarta on Wednesday. Therefore, he said, legal reform must bring about real improvements in governance, legal certainty, and public services. He explained that legal reform is interconnected and inseparable from bureaucratic reform, as the former ensures that every bureaucratic process has a clear and accountable legal basis, while the latter drives the regulation arrangement to proceed in a directed and accountable manner. He stated that the IRH does not only function as an administrative assessment tool, but also as a strategic instrument to control the quality of regulatory governance and identify areas needing improvement. Min noted that the IRH assessment results reflect the institution’s commitment to realising law-based bureaucratic reform. “Therefore, our approach to the IRH needs to shift one step forward, from merely fulfilling administrative reporting obligations to a collective substantive effort to strengthen the quality of regulatory governance in each agency,” he said. He elaborated that the IRH assessment covers four main variables, namely coordination of regulatory harmonisation, competence of legislative drafters, quality of reregulation and deregulation, and the arrangement of the legislative database. Over three years of implementation, he revealed that the IRH has shown positive developments, both in terms of agency participation and the quality of submitted data. In fact, several ministries/institutions and regional governments have made the IRH part of their performance targets. An approach oriented only towards formalities is deemed not in line with the spirit of substantive legal reform. “The supporting data compiled and uploaded must be accurate, accountable for its truthfulness, and reflect the actual conditions,” Min stated. He also emphasised that the success of legal reform is not measured by numbers alone, but by the quality of governance, institutional credibility, and increased public trust. Ultimately, Min said, legal reform must provide real benefits for national development and contribute to public welfare.