Police bill goes ahead despite criticism
Police bill goes ahead despite criticism
JAKARTA (JP): The House of Representatives has completed its
deliberation of a controversial police bill and plans to endorse
it early next month despite public criticism over some of its
articles.
Golkar legislator Andi Mattalata defended the House's work and
said yesterday that over the course of deliberation between June
and July, the bill improved significantly from the original
document.
In addition, the House accommodated "public aspirations" in
the bill, Mattalata said.
Speaking to reporters after receiving a delegation of three
lawyer associations a legal aid foundation who protested the bill
yesterday, Mattalata said the bill would also be better than the
No. 13/1965 Police Law it sought to amend.
Mattalata, who headed the House's deliberation team, said it
was impossible for the House to accommodate the lawyers' call
yesterday to postpone the discussion on the bill.
The associations included the Indonesian Bar Association,
Indonesian Advocates Association, Association of Indonesian
Lawyers, and the Foundation of the Indonesian Legal Aid Institute
(YLBHI).
"If postponed, then it will still be the 1965 law which
remains in effect. It has long been cited as obsolete compared to
our Criminal Code Procedures which many have dubbed as the
nation's monumental legal masterpiece," Mattalata said.
The three lawyer associations and YLBHI said the police bill
should not be endorsed because it failed to encompass many
"fundamental and strategic" problems.
They cited the poorly defined boundaries for what constitutes
police authority and their function "as law enforcers, and as
servants and protectors of the public".
Bambang Widjojanto of YLBHI told reporters after meeting with
Mattalata that the bill, if passed, would give police excessive
authority to use violence in the absence of a clear, controlling
body.
"If the state is given such power, it would be prone to human
rights violations," Bambang said.
Mattalata, however, argued that if the public found that
police were not using their power correctly, they could sue the
police through a pretrial court hearing allowed by the Criminal
Code Procedures.
The public would also be able to lodge complaints with the
Police Council of Ethics, which is to be established following
the endorsement of the bill, or even press charges against the
police using an upcoming law on soldiers' discipline.
The latter law, according to Mattalata, will be passed along
with the police bill, the bill on the military tribunal court,
and the bill on mass mobilization.
Separately, Aisyah Aminy of the United Development Party, who
the lawyer associations and YLBHI also met, said it was
impossible for the House to postpone the police bill.
"Besides, all input (by the lawyer associations and YLHBI) has
been discussed during the deliberation of the bill," she said.
(aan)