Sandal-theft case illustrates reality of Indonesia's court

Emmy Fitri, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The story is unremarkable, but it is both ironic and heartbreaking, as it is about a man who faces a possible five- month prison term for allegedly stealing a pair of rejected sandals from the factory of PT Osaga Mas Utama in Tangerang, where he used to work.

A lawyer claimed that the incident showed "the real story of Indonesia's courts", where the justice system favors those who are in power and discriminates against the less powerful.

Has Hamdani bin Ijin, the former factory employee, received justice? His supporters, who packed the Tangerang District Court, where the sentence demand was presented on Jan.4, booed the panel of judges as well as the prosecutors, as they considered the sentence request too heavy.

Many other cases have proved that justice is very subjective, depending not only on who the defendants are, but also who the judges are.

Lawyer Johnson Panjaitan from the Indonesian Legal Aid and Human Rights Association (PBHI) commented that Hamdani had been indicted because his former employer was being vindictive.

"There is evidently a conspiracy between the employer, the local police and the prosecutors. It is so sad that this kind of thing still happens these days, right before our very eyes," Johnson said.

The unlucky employee, 25-year-old Hamdani, denied the wrongdoing as he had not intended to steal the sandals. He took the rejected sandals without the permission of his employer and wore them when he performed wudhu (ritual ablutions) to purify himself before he performed Friday prayers at his factory compound. Some other employees used the same sandals, too.

Hamdani was a labor activist. He had organized rallies to demand salary increases and staged protests against his company for dismissing nine laborers recently, Johnson told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.

His employer forced him to sign a resignation letter shortly after he was arrested in October, Johnson added.

About two weeks before Hamdani heard the sentence request, the Central Jakarta District Court had sentenced Ari Sigit, alias Ari Haryo Wibowo, 31, grandson of former president Soeharto, to two months and 22 days imprisonment after finding him guilty of a more serious crime -- keeping 70 rounds of live ammunition at his plush residence.

Ari's crime was a violation of Emergency Law No. 12/1951, which carries a maximum sentence of death, or life in prison.

The father of three children, Ari automatically walked free after the sentence was handed down as the jail term was exactly the same as the time he had spent at the Salemba detention center and under house arrest.

Violating the same article, Jerry, a resident of Jl. Manggis, Manggarai in South Jakarta, was imprisoned for one year. Jerry owned a revolver without a license.

The court gave Ari a light sentence despite his serious crime. The sentence was even lighter than those made against defendants who were convicted of petty crimes, including unemployed Firmansyah, alias Ambon, who was sentenced to nine months imprisonment by the East Jakarta District Court last August for stealing a bicycle.

Such unfairness often takes place inside courtrooms and, most of the time, the conspiracy remains unexposed by the media.

"It is the task of lawyers and the media to play a role in monitoring such unfairness because the law enforcers themselves play a role in the collusion," he said.

As for the sandal theft case, Johnson asked the National Police and the Attorney General's Office to immediately summon their respective officers and the prosecutors involved in the case to find out what was really happening.

"Whereas now they (the police and prosecutors) are playing around with a sandal thief, later they can be manipulated by big corruptors and benefit from more serious crimes," he said.