Talks on human rights too abstract: Marzuki

JAKARTA (JP): Human rights campaigner Marzuki Darusman lauded the public's growing awareness of rights protection as shown by more seminars on the subject, but criticized the discourse as being off-target and too abstract.

He pointed out that in the past week alone there have been several different seminars on human rights taking place daily, including those held in the sessions of the People's Consultative Assembly.

However, "sometimes talks on rights protection are too abstract, too conceptual," he said during a break at a seminar on discrimination against women here yesterday.

"In fact, there are only two critical subjects on the question of human rights protection, namely that those with power must not deny other people's rights ... and that every human being has the right to a dignified life just because he or she is a human being," he said.

He dismissed debates that revolved around the idea that human rights protection suffered from "semantic problems" in its campaign to establish standards.

He pointed out that most people have in their daily lives implemented the concept of human rights promotion. "What we need to do now is to improve on the quality (of the implementation)," he said.

Marzuki Darusman is the deputy chairman of the National Commission on Human Rights, a 25-strong body established in 1993 by the President in order to study and probe reports of rights violations and prepare recommendations for action for relevant institutions.

Over the years, the commission has been able to dispel initial public doubts about its effectiveness, and has grown to be a respected body. Those who in the past placed their hope in the House of Representatives and other bodies for solutions to their problems, now have turned to the commission.

Marzuki said yesterday that 50 percent of the complaints to the National Commission on Human Rights were made by those who felt exploited by development policies or by senior officials.

"Those cases could have been handled better and faster had the government established a more efficient, effective mechanism to deal with public grievances," he said.

"Our question now is how the increasing number of grievances can be addressed more effectively by all institutions," he said, adding that "all institutions, including the House of Representatives, the government and the commission, are currently facing an increase in the number of public grievances."

He did not elaborate on the increase.

Marzuki said political reform -- which should see the House, the press, the courts and mass organizations play a more effective role -- was a prerequisite to rights promotion.

"At present, many political institutions do not perform as the public wants them to," he said.

Regarding the ongoing debate over whether Indonesia should establish a special People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) decree on human rights, dubbed as an Indonesian Bill of Rights, or incorporate the issue into the 1998/2003 state policy guidelines, Marzuki remained noncommittal.

He has said earlier that either choice was fine, as long as the concept can be enforced.

"There is hope that by institutionalizing human rights protection through a decree from the MPR, which is the highest state body, doubts on Indonesia's rights record can be dispelled," he said.

As of now, he said, human rights promotion would remain a general policy.

"What would be ideal is if human rights promotion could become an inseparable part of the nation's rights and people's lives as a whole ... by establishing it as part of the constitution," he said.

"That's the most ideal situation because the implementation of human rights promotion should be something that originates from the constitution," he said.

However, he said: "We need to be realistic that it is not possible for now because the House of Representatives' internal rules stipulate no change can be made to the constitution ... so there can be no more discussion about it for now." (09/swe)