Jakarta – Indonesian women still lack legal protection because law enforcers remain gender biased, the National Commission on Violence Against Women said Tuesday.
Retired judge Deliana Sayuti Ismudjoko of the commission said some important principles in providing legal protection for women were already specified in the 2004 Law on the Eradication of Domestic Violence, but they were not yet integrated into the Criminal Code Procedures.
Deliana said this lack of integration had resulted in gender-biased verdicts. The commission has suggested the development of a gender-sensitive court system to highlight women's perspectives in the legal process.
"Incorporating the integrated court system into the Criminal Code Procedure is our final target in an attempt to provide legal protection for women," Deliana said.
She said a number of activities had already been undertaken including seminars and workshops to build gender-sensitivity among law enforcers, including police officers, prosecutors and judges of both civil and religious courts.
She said the commission had already "approached" high-ranking officials in law enforcement agencies. "We found we needed to approach the heads of the agencies because they're the ones with the authority to make decisions," Deliana said.
The National Commission based its activities on findings by the Women's Legal Aid Foundation (LBH Apik) and the University of Indonesia (UI)'s Center for Women and Gender Studies.
LBH Apik said it had found a lot of women had reported cases of abuse to law enforcers, only to have the blame turned on them. The aid foundation said this occurred especially when women had a negative image in the community.
LBH Apik's coordinator of legal protection Nurherwati said, "Some 10 percent of violence victims reporting their cases in criminal lawsuits were accused of being perpetrators instead, and some of them even ended up as defendants". "This is due to the prosecutors' lack of gender sensitivity," Nurherwati said.
The Center for Women and Gender Studies at UI said the Supreme Court had shown better partiality to women, but that "gender balance" was not found generally across all court levels. The women's center said violence cases were "hidden" behind civil lawsuits involving divorce, inheritance disputes and polygamy.
"However, civil and religious courts handling such civil lawsuits have no authority to deal with violence related to these cases, which results in a lack of follow-up," the center's head Sulistyowati Irianto said. She said law schools should incorporate gender studies into their curriculums.
Former policewoman Irawati Harsono, also the founder of the NGO Derap Warapsari, said education on women's rights should also be incorporated into law enforcement training agencies. But Irawati said this was a difficult task due to the "typical characteristics" of the agencies, which she said tended to avoid change. (wda)