Priority bills includes pacts on antiterrorism
Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The House of Representatives (DPR) said on Monday it planned to deliberate 55 bills this year, including three bills on the ratification of an international convention to suppress terrorism and transnational crimes.
However, the ability of the lawmakers to meet their legislation targets, observers say, much depends on the availability of budget funds and the capabilities of their expert advisors.
The three conventions up for ratification are the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings, and the United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime.
Although the legislative program has been discussed during the past three months, several legislators still protested the exclusion of some bills from the list.
Soekartono Hadiwarsito of the Democratic Party suggested that the legislators should also include bills on oil and gas and electricity on this year's priority list.
"The two bills should be prioritized because they are important," he said at a plenary meeting presided over by House deputy speaker Zaenal Ma'arif.
Fellow legislator Suryama M. Sastra of the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) also questioned the exclusion of the bill on state intelligence agencies from the list.
He suggested the intelligence bill should be deliberated simultaneously with the bills on freedom of information and state secrecy, which have been given priority.
Suryama said a simultaneous deliberation of the three bills would reduce possible conflicting articles in the three related laws.
Zaenal reminded the House that legislators or the government could still propose other bills for urgency.
In his speech, chairman of the House's Legislation Body (Baleg) Muhammad AS Hikam said that the House's approval of the National Legislation Program (Prolegnas) would be a reference for the legislators in the law-making process.
The 55 bills set to be deliberated in 2005 were part of 284 bills to be tabled for deliberation during the 2005-2009 period, Hikam said.
Some of these bill, however, could be merged into one to avoid unnecessary duplication and faster deliberation, he said, citing specifically the bills on the presidency, the presidential advisory board, and on the Cabinet.
House bills are prioritized if they are left over from the 1999-2004 period, function as supplementary regulations, relate to other existing laws or are linked to the ratification of international conventions.
Separately, the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights legal representative Abdulgani Abdullah said the revision of the Criminal Code would be among the 55 prioritized bills.
"The Criminal Code consists of more than 700 articles, therefore deliberations about its revision should be started as soon as possible. They could take three years to finish," he said.
Legislators are also set to deliberate bills on immigration, citizenship, the religious courts, and the protection of witnesses.