Being Religious Minority in Indonesia

I’ve been keeping tracks on reports of religious violence towards minority groups in Indonesia for several years now. I follow them for several reasons. First is because of my human rights background, which means I am automatically interested in human rights issues, and religious freedom is obviously a human rights issue. Second, and no less important than the first one, is because this is personal for me. I am not a religious person. I don’t go to church that often, but to celebrate major events, and sometimes I even question my belief. However, I still consider myself as a member of a religious group – Christianity, which in Indonesia is considered minority. My family and some of my friends are Christians. That is why the plights of Christian people in this country affect me, more or less.

Looking at all the cases of the last few years, I have to say that I am really unhappy with the state of religious freedom in Indonesia. There seems to be a rise in intolerance (I prefer not to say a rise in radicalism here because I don’t think that all people who reject the rights of non-Moslems to worship are radicals, but they are certainly intolerant). We have cases of violence against minority groups, mass demonstrations to close house of worships, abuses, and so on.  There were even people killed because of their belief (see here).  

All these cases have created a certain feeling of abandonment in me. It feels like we are slowly being evicted out of our country, like we are no longer wanted. Even more unsettling is the fact that the government seems to not do much to prevent all those cases to happen. There is a growing perception amongst the minority groups that we are left to fend this on our own, that they do not really care whether we can worship the way we please or our way of life is being threatened. Add to that is the fact that it seems sometimes the government even take an active role in fanning the flames of these groups – these intolerant groups who want nothing else but the expulsion of all minorities out of Indonesia.

Take for example the latest case of the church HKBP Filadelfia, in Tambun, Bekasi. The local Bekasi government refused to obey the ruling by the High Court that says that the church Filadelfia should be allowed to continue its activities, repealing the local government edict of 2009 that banned the church to continue its worship service.  Somehow the case reminds me of similar unresolved case in Bogor of GKI Yasmin. In that case, the local Bogor government, refused to obey the ruling of the Supreme Court that allows GKI Yasmin congregation to continue worshiping in their building.

There are other similarities between the two cases. One, the two cases saw the active efforts by the local government, after getting pressures from several ‘religious’ groups, to stop a local church to continue its service. Two, in both cases, the central government, the one with the mandate to uphold the constitution, the rule of law and the protection of the human rights of all its citizens,  refuses to intervene. The central government chooses to ignore the matter, citing that the issue is of local concerns, forgetting that they have the responsibility to uphold the law and to protect their citizens. Three, there are thugs involved - 'religious' thugs. They block people to come to church. They hurl abuses and insults towards the members of the congregations, even throwing stuffs (there are reports of people throwing pee in bottles). 

Indonesian government claims itself as a democratic country. Apparently, their brand of democracy is closer to the ‘tyranny of majority’ rather than a true democracy, at least for now. Cases of religious intolerance, even violence, where the police and government refuse to do anything about it, seem to confirm this. I am always hopeful for the future of Indonesia, and I do love this country. However, I am worried that, unless decisive steps are taken soon, more and more Indonesian minorities will feel isolated, abandoned and left out; even feel discriminated. That may not bode well for our future. 

see these links for further info: 

http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/news/religious-groups-criticize-government-for-weak-support-of-religious-freedom/519144

http://www.humanrights.asia/news/ahrc-news/AHRC-OLT-009-2012#.T7n60jUiqO8.facebook

Is Indonesia a Democracy?

Democracy is a very difficult term. A simple definition of democracy is ‘the government by the people, of the people, and for the people’. An even simpler definition of democracy is ‘the rule of the majority’. Using these definitions, it seems almost certain that Indonesia is a functioning democracy. After all, it has all the mechanisms to ensure that the voice of the majority will be heard in (and influence) decision-making process. Election is one; clear separation and distribution of power is another. Maybe we can also add mass protest as one existing mechanism of democracy - by that definition - in Indonesia.

However, I do not think that democracy is only about the will of the majority. Many social movements in history – the seeds of democracy – concerned themselves about giving voice to the voiceless. Thus the first labor movement concerned themselves of giving rights to laborers who previously did not have rights, and the original women suffrage movement struggled to give women the rights that they previously did not enjoy, and so on. These movements and struggles would later on influence the way democracy is supposed to be done. They provide the contemporary democracy with one additional important defining characteristic: true democracy protects the rights of everyone and extends it even to anyone who was not protected before, regardless whether they are part of the majority or not.

From this point of view then we can start to question whether Indonesia is a truly functioning democracy or not. Because it seems that democracy in Indonesia only works in the first sense: to obey the rule of the majority, but it stutters when it wants to enter the next level of democracy: the protection of everyone’s rights, which includes minorities and the disenfranchised (religious minorities, persons with disabilities, homosexuals, etc).  Cases of religious intolerance, lack of access of persons with disabilities, violence towards homosexuals, and others, seem to highlight this reality of Indonesia’s democracy.  Before we can give protection and guarantee the rights of these groups, I think it is still a long way to go before we can safely say that we are a democratic country.

Yet I do think that Indonesia still has some hopes. For one thing, change is brewing. Economy is improving, and with that comes a better connection to (and understanding of) the outside world and, at the same time, of our inner self. People are beginning to challenge old and outdated beliefs, and are more willing to be a little bit more tolerant to differences in taste, in style, in preference, in opinion, and in political beliefs.  Indonesia has a long history of tolerance (although at the same time it has a long history of intolerance as well), and we can dig and focus on these long traditions to be used as a foundation to extend and expand human rights protection. To extend means to give rights protection to more groups, to expand means to enlarge the scope of rights we are currently enjoying. When this happens, then we can proudly say that Indonesia is a democratic country.

ICC: one verdict, ten years, $900 million, worth it?

Today ICC delivered its first verdict, 10 years after it was first established. It has used up to $900 million of expenditure in 10 years with just one verdict to show. With cases lining up to be tried many worry that ICC budget will keep going up significantly. Some begin to question ICC effectiveness and, even, usefulness.

I think such concern is justified, Yet, I believe that despite the cost it is worth it to have ICC as a permanent international court. The international world needs ICC as a mechanism to ensure prosecution for the worse international crimes. Without it, we will be left only with regional mechanisms, or international tribunals such as the ones for former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, and  everybody knows how expensive international tribunals can be. In fact they are actually more expensive than ICC. Whereas regional mechanisms have limited reach and scope. ICC is relatively cheaper than international tribunals and have wider reach and scope than the regional mechanisms.

In addition to that, ICC can play a larger role than just prosecuting cases. It can add pressures to governments to take actions to stop human rights violation by using its investigation and communication function, it can help shape public opinions, and many more.

ICC helps by shaping international law jurisprudence by its decisions (although we only have one so far, I am sure we will have more). Countries can refer to ICC to help decide human rights cases on their own.

Lastly, ICC is a noble human endeavor which should not be judged by how much it costs us. We sent human to the moon, probes to the farthest distance of the solar system, and we don't care about how much that cost us, because we believe that such endeavors will advance civilization and the human race. We should treat this ICC project with the same passion and belief. At the very least, I think it is better to fund ICC than to pay for more guns and bombs.

Yes. ICC is worth it.

Check this link for more info: http://www.icc-cpi.int/NR/exeres/A70A5D27-18B4-4294-816F-BE68155242E0.htm

ICJ to Decide on Hissene Habre's Case

Belgium has filed a case in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to request Senegal to extradite the former president of Chad, Hissene Habre.

Hissene Habre is a former president of Chad from 1982 to 1990 before he was forced to step down by Idriss Deby. According to human rights activitis Habre was responsible for the killings and torture of thousands of people during his rule. After his fall, Habre went to live in Senegal and has stayed there ever since.

The first attempt to indict Mr. Habre was in the court of Senegal, but it was then ruled by the court that Mr. Habre cannot be tried there. The victims then went to Belgium who claims universal jurisdiction for international crimes (which covers genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity). In 2005, the Belgium court issued a ruling to arrest Mr. Habre for crimes against humanity. Since then, Belgium has been trying to extradite Mr. Habre from Senegal, but to no avail. The filing of the case to ICJ is the latest attempt by Belgium to bring Mr. Habre to justice. Belgium cites a duty for all states in the world in regards to international crimes to prosecute or to extradite alleged offender. Therefore, if Senegal does not want to prosecute Mr. Habre, it should extradite him to a country that will, which in this case is Belgium.

I find this case is interesting for a number of reasons.

First, because it represents a real test for the universal jurisdiction claimed by Belgium. If this succeeds, then it can set a precedent for other countries to follow Belgium's example, that is to claim universal jurisdiction for international crimes. If this happens then any country can put to trial anyone on international crimes charges, even if that person is a foreign citizen and does not reside in the country where the trial takes place. This will represent a major breakthrough for the fight against impunity for many international crimes.

Second, it represents a real test for ICJ to judge on human rights cases. There were cases on human rights put to ICJ before, but the quantity is not that great. Therefore this has the potential to set further precedents on human rights cases in ICJ, and I hope it will be a positive precedent.

Of course, one should not overestimate the impact of this case on the development of international human rights law. For one thing, ICJ's decisions are binding only to state parties involved. Also, there are only a limited numbers of states who recognized the jurisdiction of ICJ, which means the impact will be very limited. But despite that, I still think this will be an important precedent for human rights justice.

International Women's Day

This is a bit late, but to celebrate the International Women's Day on March 8th, I am putting these links:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkarsUszRfg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEFTC05cmhk&feature=related

They are the speech delivered by Hillary Clinton at the 4th World Conference on Women in Beijing, 1994. Many people consider this speech as a historic speech, because it gives passionate articulation of why women's rights should be considered as part of human rights, and therefore human rights protection should also cover the protection of women's rights. It's a wonderful speech and I hope you enjoy listening to it.

Kony 2012? Good or Bad?

The youtube video 'Kony 2012', made by a group called "Invisible Children" went viral in the last couple of weeks. The video is aiming to make Joseph Kony - indicted war criminal by the ICC and still on the lose - to be so famous that his capture becomes possible. In its first week the video hit 20 million views. Now it is approaching 60 million views.

Although it has raised a lot of awareness regarding Joseph Kony, it has also drawn many critics. Some people say that the video over-simplifies the conflict in Uganda, painting it in a black-and-white frame. It portrays Joseph Kony as the ultimate bad guy that needs to be captured . There are some other things too.

I think there are some truths in what the critics are saying. However, I will just let you read their articles by yourself. Here are the links:

http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/post/18890947431/we-got-trouble

and

http://thisisafrica.wordpress.com/2012/03/07/acholi-street-stop-kony2012-invisible-childrens-campaign-of-infamy/

Of course it won't be fair unless I put invisible children's answer to the critics. Here is the link:

http://s3.amazonaws.com/www.invisiblechildren.com/critiques.html

The Public and the Private in Human Rights

Human Rights was first constructed to limit states' power and sovereignty. The limiting of state power then created two separate spaces, called the Public and the Private. The Public is the space where state operates, whereas the private is the space where state cannot operate. One of the aims of human rights activism, in particular the Western-type human rights activism, is the enlargement of the Private space and the reducing of the Public space. However, for me, this type of activism can be problematic in various regards.

The first one is that the whole human rights regime, the international treaties and conventions, which is supposed to be adopted by states, depends on state sovereignty. It depends on the state willingness to adopt the human rights regime in its system. If human rights is aiming to reduce the limit of state power, the question then: how can we expect states to adopt human rights regime, if they know that this regime will cause their power to diminish? How to make states to comply to something that they clearly do not want?

The Transnational Legal Process theory tries to answer this question by pointing out the role of the domestic civil society (represented by NGOs) in the internalization of human rights norm. However, this can only be possible in a relatively democratic country, where the involvement of civil society is an essential component of legitimacy. The theory cannot answer how autocratic states can be forced to comply to human rights regime. This huge blank becomes particularly relevant when we take a look at some real life examples, such as what happening in China, or in Burma, now.

I do not have a clear answer, now. However, one of my hunches (let us call it a hunch), is probably that human rights activism should not be aimed at limiting states power on these countries, rather it should appear as if human rights can expand states power, by expanding the public and limiting the private, rather the other way around, thus enticing these autocratic states to adopt human rights regime. Again, this is not a clear answer, just a hunch. I cannot deliberate further here, because of limited space and time. I do think that more research should be done on this area.

The second problem is that this distinction can sometimes blurred the question of responsibility. Many feminist activists have pointed this problem. Their well known jargon is “the private is the political”. By that, they try to point out that the women oppression do not happen only in the public sphere, but it also happens – or it happens particularly – in the private sphere. Because it happens in the private sphere, responsibility becomes a non-issue and oppression can continue without challenge. The private sphere, which is supposed to become a place of sanctuary from states oppression, becomes the very place that human rights activists loathe: a jail, or even a torture chamber, where no one can interfere.

The third problem is related to the previous one. Recent experience has shown us that human rights violation can happen not just when states become too powerful. Now we have a notion of “failed states”, where states cannot perform its function in providing the protection of human rights. On these failed states, violation of human rights happen on daily basis. Yet even so, people know about these things, the question of who has the responsibility to protect becomes useless to ask, and the distinction of the public and the private becomes redundant. At the end of the day, even though human rights is aiming to limit states power, we still need the states, even if their function is only to enforce the distinction between the public and the private.

I am not saying that we should do away with the separation between the public and private. In certain respect, maybe we do need this distinction.  We need a space where state cannot interrupt and disturb our lives. However, I think it is really important to rethink about the balance between what is public and what is private, in the context of human rights.