Human Rights Council chamber, Geneva. Photo credit: http://sweetcrudereports.com/2012/10/11/unity-is-fundamental-in-our-fight-for-human-rights-un-and-african-experts-stress-on-key-anniversary/
In 19 September 2012 (Wednesday), the 21st
Session of the Human Rights Council (HRC) in Geneva is scheduled among others to
adopt the report of the Working Group of Universal Periodic Review (UPR) on
Indonesia. In this session, not only adoption as such, Indonesia, however, is
also required to give its verbal responses to 36 pending recommendations out of
180 recommendations that were received during its review last May (as we may
recall, Indonesia was reviewed by the UPR Working Group on 23-25 May 2012).
Hence, the most immediate and
pertinent questions from this event are: what should we expect after the adoption
Indonesia’s UPR report by the Council. What would the government do with those
recommendations, and do other stakeholders can or have role with regard to the
implementation of those recommendations?
From the written document submitted by
Indonesia to the Human Rights Council in
early September as a response to 36 pending recommendations (http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/UPR/Pages/IDSession13.aspx),
it could be identified that Indonesia
accepted six more recommendations out of 144 recommendations that it directly
accepted during its UPR last May. Hence, Indonesia accepted a total of 150
recommendations and rejected 30 recommendations, which is a not bad acceptance record
for a state under review in UPR. What is
more worth noting from the document also that no recommendation was directly
rejected by Indonesia in the course of the review.
It should be underlined here, however,
that it is not number that matters but how much from the recommendations given
can be accepted by the government under review. Indeed, small island states in
Pacific will not have many recommendations. The bigger size of the country,
therefore, the more complex their human rights issue is.
Indeed, the recommendations given to Indonesia by its
fellow UN member states in UPR comprised a wide array of issues and aspects of
human rights. They range from civil political rights to social, economic and
cultural ones including the protection of vulnerable groups such as children
and women.
What could be also easily noticed from
the said document is that Indonesia mostly accepted recommendations regarding the
call to ratify international human rights instruments. In this, one of things that we could note that the
government needs expedite its efforts to ratify the Convention of the Protection
of all persons from Enforced Disappearance (CPED) which Indonesia signed in
2010.
In accordance with the document also
that most recommendations rejected were neither necessarily on the basis of
like and dislike nor the Government has been being too sensitive with the issues
raised in the recommendation but on the fact that many of those are
recommendations are either obsolete or do not accurately describe the fact or
challenges faced by Indonesia. For
example, Indonesia was recommended to ratify the Convention on the
Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), while in fact Indonesia has
ratified it in 2011. Another example is that Indonesia recommended bringing the
wardens who are committed to prisoners’ abuse to civilian courts. This is a
gross inaccuracy in making this recommendation since criminal cases committed
by wardens in Indonesia are tried in civilian court jurisdiction and are never
brought to military court.
With
regard to future plan, it is true that the most logical things to do by the
Government of Indonesia are to incorporate them with national human rights
action plan particularly those are already in line with the plan. By this, it
is expected that their implementation will be easily conducted by the
ministries and agencies concerned since they are already in their program and
budget.
Of course we all expect that the UPR
exercise would give a positive impetus and impact for Indonesia’s promotion and
protection of human rights. Hence, in regards to the roles for the relevant
stakeholders in responding these UPR recommendations, at least there are three
things worth pondering.
First, there is a need to build a strong
sense of ownership from relevant stakeholders to heed recommendations accepted
by Indonesia. Consequently, a further intensive dissemination of information to
relevant stakeholders both at national and district levels is imperative.
Furthermore, although the state is still held responsible for all aspects of
human rights of its people, however, at this time this issue is solely not a
government’s matter anymore particularly concerning its promotion of respect
and protection related aspect. The seeds of sense ownership in fact have
already been built from several exercises.
For example, Indonesia has a successively three human rights national
action plans each of which is derived from broad consultations from national
stakeholders including civil society.
Second, there is a need to establish a
mechanism for periodical monitoring for the implementation of those accepted UPR
recommendations. I believe the civil society may have a bigger role in this
issue. Civil society or even parliament can play a role both in supporting the
national’s human rights agenda through working together with government or take
check-and-balance role.
Lastly, there should be no room for
self-complacent. Although most recommendations given in the UPR were accepted
by Indonesia which shows that they mosltly are in line with national’s human
rights priorities and programs, we should not also self-content since in human
rights term, no country is perfect. In particular, on the basis of the repeated
claims that no gross human rights violations occurred in the more than past
decades. Human rights fulfillment cannot
be measured by that yardstick alone. Instead, human right promotion, protection
and fulfillment are work in progress or progressive issue. We should set and
strife for the highest standard whenever possible.
----
Jakarta, 18 September 2012
[1]
The writer is an alumnus of Sesparlu Batch 46/ 33rd Senior
Leadership Training Course of the National Institute for Public Administration.
The opinions expressed herein are of his personal views.
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