Verdicts show court integrity: Expert

SEMARANG, Central Java (JP): The integrity of the courts of law is determined to a large extend by the verdicts they produce, noted law expert Satjipto Rahardjo said.

Joining in the end of year nationwide polemic on the performance of the courts in Indonesia, Satjipto said that the courts cannot ask for the respect of the public. Rather it should gain that respect through its deeds, in this case its verdicts.

"We can draw an analogy with teachers. A teacher does not need to scream at his students to demand they show him respect," said the law professor at the state-run Diponegoro University.

"A teacher can only command respect by teaching properly, sharing his knowledge. This will impress the students and they, in turn, will respect him," he told The Jakarta Post.

Satjipto also said that the courts must show greater consistency from one ruling to another if they want to gain greater public respect.

Recently the integrity of the courts has been questioned by some legal experts following a number of controversial rulings it made this year. Some of the rulings reflected its independence and won plaudits but others prompted jeers and raised questions about how far the courts really are in being independent of the government.

The government's plan to raise judges's salaries by 200 percent, designed to strengthen their integrity, beginning in January, has further fueled the debate.

Satjipto said one of the best verdicts to come this year was the one issued by justice Asikin Kusumah Atmadja, of the Supreme Court, in his decision to reverse the high court ruling in the Kedung Ombo land dispute and award judgment for the villagers and not the government.

He referred particularly to the content of the verdict and not the decision itself, which has since be overturned by the Supreme Court upon appeal from the government. Asikin has since been retired from the Supreme Court.

He said Asikin, in his ruling, elaborated at length about the "deliberation", giving his constructive interpretation of the word and then faulting the government for failing to indulge in this activity in setting compensation for the villagers whose land was procured by the state for a huge reservoir.

The Supreme Court simply did not believe that the government had taken the necessary steps to deliberate with the villagers, Satjipto said.

He also argued that the courts performance is also determined by the social structure in which they exist. "They are public institutions and therefore, cannot be independent of the social settings," he said.

"Understanding the interactions between the courts and the social structure is necessary in order to diagnose, and then provide a therapy to cure, the ills of our courts."

Satjipto said the rises in judges salary, while timely, has fueled a debate which, in turn, could raised the people's expectations of the judges' performance exceedingly high.

"This could boomerang on the judges themselves," he said. (emb)