Located in Asia, Indonesia consists of 17,000 islands. Indonesia shares land borders with Papua New Guinea, East Timor, and Malaysia, as well as maritime borders with Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam, Philippines, Australia, Palau, and India. The population of this country is approx 27,77,00,000 with 19,04,569 square kilometers area. The official language is Indonesian, as well as more than 700 languages are in use in civil life. There are more than 1300 ethnic communities. In terms of religion, 86% are Muslims, 10% are Christians, and 1.7% are Hindus.
Indonesia's constitution has very few interesting parts. Impoverished persons and abandoned children shall be taken care of by the State. The State shall have the obligation to provide sufficient medical and public service facilities.
These are positive aspects. Now let's discuss the negative aspects.
According to the constitution, the Parliament of Indonesia, "People's Consultative Assembly - MPR." shall convene a session at least once every five years, and the "People's Representative Council - DPR." shall convene a session at least once every one year. One of the prerequisites of democracy is an effective parliament, which is active all the time. Indonesia's Parliament is just a puppet parliament. Even the President's power to legislate is unusual.
Religious courts have constitutional recognition. The development of science and technology must be relevant to religion.
Admirable Articles of Indonesia's Constitution
Article 28A
Every person shall have the right to live and to defend his/her life and existence.
Article 28B (Part of it)
2. Every child shall have the right to live, to grow and to develop, and shall have the right to protection from violence and discrimination.
Article 28E
1. Every person shall be free to choose and to practice the religion of his/her choice, to choose one's education, to choose one's employment, to choose one's citizenship, and to choose one's place of residence within the state territory, to leave it and to subsequently return to it.
2. Every person shall have the right to the freedom to believe his/her faith (kepercayaan), and to express his/her views and thoughts, in accordance with his/her conscience.
3. Every person shall have the right to the freedom to associate, to assemble and to express opinions.
Article 28G (Part of it)
1. Every person shall have the right to protection of his/herself, family, honour, dignity, and property, and shall have the right to feel secure against and receive protection from the threat of fear to do or not do something that is a human right.
Article 28I (Part of it)
2. Every person shall have the right to be free from discriminative treatment based upon any grounds whatsoever and shall have the right to protection from such discriminative treatment.
4. The protection, advancement, upholding and fulfillment of human rights are the responsibility of the state, especially the government.
5. For the purpose of upholding and protecting human rights in accordance with the principle of a democratic and law-based state, the implementation of human rights shall be guaranteed, regulated and set forth in laws and regulations.
Article 28J
1. Every person shall have the duty to respect the human rights of others in the orderly life of the community, nation and state.
2. In exercising his/her rights and freedoms, every person shall have the duty to accept the restrictions established by law for the sole purposes of guaranteeing the recognition and respect of the rights and freedoms of others and of satisfying just demands base upon considerations of morality, religious values, security and public order in a democratic society.
Article 34
1. Impoverished persons and abandoned children shall be taken care of by the State.
2. The State shall develop a system of social security for all of the people and shall empower the inadequate and underprivileged in society in accordance with human dignity.
3. The State shall have the obligation to provide sufficient medical and public service facilities.
4. Further provisions in relation to the implementation of this Article shall be regulated by law.
Facts of Indonesia's Constitution
Preamble (Part of it)
By the grace of God Almighty and motivated by the noble desire to live a free national life, the people of Indonesia hereby declare their independence.
Subsequent thereto, to form a government of the state of Indonesia which shall protect all the people of Indonesia and all the independence and the land that has been struggled for, and to improve public welfare, to educate the life of the people and to participate toward the establishment of a world order based on freedom, perpetual peace and social justice, therefore the independence of Indonesia shall be formulated into a constitution of the Republic of Indonesia which shall be built into a sovereign state based on a belief in the One and Only God, just and civilised humanity, the unity of Indonesia, and democratic life led by wisdom of thoughts in deliberation amongst representatives of the people, and achieving social justice for all the people of Indonesia.
Chapter II. The People's Consultative Assembly (Majelis Permusyawaratan Rakyat or MPR)
Article 2
1. The MPR shall consist of the members of the DPR and the members of the DPD who have been elected through general elections, and shall be regulated further by law.
2. The MPR shall convene in a session at least once in every five years in the capital of the State.
3. All decisions of the MPR shall be taken by a majority vote.
Article 9
1. Prior to taking office, the President and Vice President shall swear an oath in accordance with their respective religions or shall make a solemn promise before the MPR or DPR. The oath or promise shall be as follows:
Presidential (Vice-Presidential) Oath:
"I swear before God that, to the best of my ability, I shall fulfil as justly as possible my duties as President (Vice-President) of the Republic of Indonesia, that I shall uphold faithfully the Constitution, conscientiously implement all statutes and regulations, and shall devote myself to the service of Country and Nation."
Presidential (Vice-Presidential) Promise:
"I solemnly promise that, to the best of my ability, I shall fulfil as justly as possible my duties as President (Vice-President) of the Republic of Indonesia, that I shall uphold faithfully the Constitution, conscientiously implement all statutes and regulations, and shall devote myself to the service of Country and Nation."
2. In the event that the MPR or DPR is unable to convene a sitting, the President and Vice-President shall swear an oath in accordance with their respective religions or shall make a solemn promise before the leadership of the MPR witnessed by the leadership of the Supreme Court.
Article 19
1. Members of the DPR shall be elected through a general election.
2. The structure of the DPR shall be regulated by law.
3. The DPR shall convene in a session at least once a year.
Article 20
1. The DPR shall hold the authority to establish laws.
2. Each bill shall be discussed by the DPR and the President to reach joint approval.
3. If a bill fails to reach joint approval, that bill shall not be reintroduced within the same DPR term of sessions.
4. The President signs a jointly approved bill to become a law.
5. If the President fails to sign a jointly approved bill within 30 days following such approval, that bill shall legally become a law and must be promulgated.
Article 22
1. Should exigencies compel, the President shall have the right to establish government regulations in lieu of laws.
2. Such government regulations must obtain the approval of the DPR during its next session.
3. Should there be no such approval, these government regulations shall be revoked.
Article 24
1. The judicial power shall be independent and shall possess the power to organise the judicature in order to enforce law and justice.
2. The judicial power shall be implemented by a Supreme Court and judicial bodies underneath it in the form of public courts, religious affairs courts, military tribunals, and state administrative courts, and by a Constitutional Court.
Article 28
The freedom to associate and to assemble, to express written and oral opinions, etc., shall be regulated by law.
Article 29
1. The State shall be based upon the belief in the One and Only God.
2. The State guarantees all persons the freedom of worship, each according to his/her own religion or belief.
Article 31 (Part of it)
5. The government shall advance science and technology with the highest respect for religious values and national unity for the advancement of civilisation and prosperity of humankind.
