Poor civil registration leads to rights deprivation: UN

M. Taufiqurrahman, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The United Nations (UN) prodded the Indonesian government on Friday to establish, as soon as possible, a comprehensive and non-discriminatory civil registration system to ensure efficient development planning and protect the rights of its citizen.

An official from the New York-based UN Statistics Division, Srdjan Mrkic, said without the proper functioning of the civil registration system, Indonesia had in the past suffered from inefficient development planning as it was often based on population estimates which were questionable in their accuracy and reliability.

"Due to a poor registration system, in the year 2000, the Indonesian population estimate was 210 million, while the actual figure turned out to be 203 million. Therefore the government has spent more resources than it should," he told a press briefing here Friday.

He gave the example that, not having accurate population figures could result in either too many or too few teachers and schools in certain districts. "This is related to the fact that reliable data on school children is unavailable."

Poor coverage of birth registration has also resulted in the susceptibility of children to age-related abuse, exploitation and discrimination.

The civil registration system is responsible for collecting data relating to birth, death, marriage and divorce, and other elements of the civil status of individuals.

Indonesia is one of 19 countries in the world with the lowest coverage of birth registration. Only 40 percent of Indonesian children under the age of five are officially registered. The figures are lower for other events, such as marriage and divorce.

The country's civil registration system is also hindered by discriminative practices. The public widely believes that children who are born from parents whose religious beliefs are not recognized by the government will have difficulties in obtaining a birth certificate.

Children of a certain race or ethnicity are also allegedly discriminated against in the obtainment of a birth certificate.

The system has also been afflicted with corruption. Parents must pay a considerable amount of money to officials at the civil registration office to get their documents processed.

The United Nations Child Emergency Fund (UNICEF) section head of child protection Birgithe Lund Henriksen said that the system's deficiencies were largely contributed to by the fact that Indonesia did not have a comprehensive law on civil registration.

"Indonesia has 15 different laws that touch on civil registration, some of which date back to the Dutch colonial era," she said.

Birgithe said that UNICEF is currently supporting the National Consortium on Civil Registration, to develop a generic law on civil registration compatible with Universal principles. "This is the first of its kind for Indonesia," she said.

The consortium consists of representatives from Ministry of Justice and Human Rights, Ministry of Home Affairs and concerned non-governmental organizations, she said.

"The drafting of the law is expected to wrap up by the year- end. Afterwards the home affairs ministry will submit the draft law to the House of Representatives for further deliberation," she said.