Repeal of discriminative laws on citizenship urged

Repeal of discriminative laws on citizenship urged

JAKARTA (JP): The House of Representatives is being urged to
repeal two laws on citizenship and replace them with one which is
nondiscriminative.

The demand for the repealing of Law No. 3/1946 and Law No.
62/1958 arose during a round-table discussion held by the
National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) and the Anti
Discriminative Struggle Movement (Gandi) on Friday.

Hartono Mardjono, deputy chairman of House Commission II for
home and legal affairs, said the laws discriminate since they use
the term "native Indonesian people" in their first articles to
define an Indonesian citizen.

The Crescent Star Party (PBB) legislator also conceded that
the law was gender biased since citizenship is based on the
father.

He said that while both laws remain effective another bill
currently being drafted on citizenship also contained
discriminative articles.

Komnas HAM deputy chairman Bambang W. Suharto agreed that such
laws should not differentiate ethnicity or gender.

"I believe that a father and a mother should have equal right
to decide their children's citizenship," Bambang said.

But the director of constitutional law at the Ministry of Law
and Legislation, Aan Danu Giartono, said such gender biases
remained a relevant fact of life since most Indonesian cultural
traditions adhered to a patriarchal system with the father
recognized as the head of the household.

"As a woman, I'd like the bill not to discriminate against
women," Aan said.

She said she hoped the bill would be debated further and that
the public would make concrete suggestions.

Since the resignation of former president Soeharto there has
been a strong push to review many laws deemed ethnically
discriminative.

Meanwhile, the chairman of the People's Consultative Assembly
(MPR) Ad Hoc Committee on Constitutional Amendment, Jacob Tobing,
said the bill could be proposed after the Assembly finished
making the final changes to the Constitution.

"There are also some discriminative articles in the
Constitution which should to be amended," Jacob, who is a
legislator of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle, said
in the discussion.

He said, for example, Article 6 of the Constitution which
states that the president must be a "native Indonesian" would be
amended to a "native citizen".

He defined native citizen as a person born in the country
whose parents are Indonesian citizens by birth, not by
naturalization. (jun)