Jakarta – Indonesia's judicial system is still reluctant to reform itself and is neglecting calls for greater transparency in its court verdicts, a legal expert says.
"The most difficult problem for judicial reform in this country is to change the mindset of those individuals working in the judiciary," the dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Indonesia, Hikmahanto Juwana, told a meeting of donors to the Partnership, a non-governmental organization pushing governance reforms in Indonesia, here Wednesday.
He added: "It's not enough to only reform the structure of the system and it's not enough to only have the regulation. There should be a change of mindset."
He also said technology could be used to electronically record court verdicts to enable the public to easily access them. "Some judges oppose the idea by saying a certain law prohibits them from giving the public access to the verdicts," Hikmahanto said. Some lower-level judiciary staffers also reject the idea because they fear loosing their source of income, he said.
"Students of mine have to pay Rp 250,000 (about US$28) to Rp 500,000 ($56) to obtain a verdict (to read)," he said, adding that even judges must pay to retrieve recorded court verdicts.
Hikmahanto said the shift in mindset should also focus on the recruitment process. "Even up until now, professionals who want to work in the judicial system are being asked to pay to do so."
It has been reported that anyone seeking appointment to a judgeship is required to pay at least Rp 100 million to be made eligible.
Hikmahanto also said the government must be able to pay decent salaries to judges and prosecutors in order to attract high-quality professionals to the sector. "Incentives for those judges that are sent to remote areas are also important.
"Before the reform, the law was marginalized due to the (government's) focus on economic development. So, changing the mindset is very difficult," he said.
Hikmahanto added that judicial reform was arduous because of the common expectation of a "trickle-down effect" from the highest judicial body, the Supreme Court.
A high court in Makassar, South Sulawesi, has, however, initiated mild reforms by uploading its verdicts to its Web site, which, Hikmahanto said, "is a remarkable thing that I cannot find in other high courts".
The Supreme Court began uploading its verdicts at the beginning of this year, according to Wiwiek Awiati, a consultant for the Judicial Reform Team at the Supreme Court.
"However, the problem remains in the lack of funds. The Supreme Court supports this effort to open public access to court verdicts as long as it is financed by individual lower courts," she said.
Wiwiek said the Supreme Court has already formed a task force to formulate a regulation on judicial transparency.
"The progress (of the task force) has reached over 75 percent. In the next two months this regulation will be signed by the chief justice," she said.
"The main spirit of this regulation is that the public should be able to access every court verdict freely." There should not be any additional charges other than copy fees, she added.
The upcoming Supreme Court regulation, according to Wiwiek, will also consider the partial confidentiality rule for verdicts that concern, for example, an individual's privacy, such as verdicts on rape cases.