Irawaty Wardany, Jakarta – The Jakarta chapter of the Legal Aid Foundation said that 2010 was a gloomy year for law enforcement and human rights.
"Over the year we saw a degeneration of the government's commitment to uphold law and human rights," Restaria F. Hutabarat from LBH Jakarta's research, development and study division told a press conference at the foundation's headquarters on Jl. Diponegoro, Central Jakarta, on Wednesday.
She said there was tendency for the government's legal institutions not to give substantial justice to the people, whereas people were becoming more aware of their rights.
The tendency was evinced by the increasing number of cases reported to LBH Jakarta. "During 2010, we received 1,150 cases that were mostly reported collectively, by groups of people," Restaria said.
The figure for 2010 was up from 1,060 cases in 2009, she added. "Most of the cases reported to LBH Jakarta were dominated by labor issues, followed by civil and political rights violations and urban and family cases," she said.
Labor cases mostly involved unfair working contracts, arbitrary layoffs and violations of basic labor rights regarding salaries, vacations and insurance, Restaria said.
Violations of civil and political rights involved criminal law, a lack of transparency in the judiciary, legal inequalities and torture, she said.
Urban cases were dominated by forced evictions, such as happened in Ciracas, East Jakarta and Guji Baru, West Jakarta; in addition to the eviction of the Cina Benteng Chinese-Indonesian community in Tangerang and a land ownership dispute case in Koja, North Jakarta.
LBH Jakarta also recorded an increasing number of torture allegations made by criminal suspects after police interrogation. "This year we recorded 10 torture cases filed with us, twice the number from last year," Restaria said.
The cases reflected the general tendency of police officers to spend less time on cases implicating or reported by poor people, she added.
"We also see a threat to religious freedom as the escalation of violence towards minority religious groups has increased," Restaria said, adding there was a eight religious freedom complaints lodged with the LBH Jakarta.
A report by Moderate Muslim Society's (MMS) released on Tuesday showed a similar pattern of incidents, recording 81 cases of religious intolerance in 2010, up from 59 cases in 2009. Most cases occurred in Greater Jakarta areas of Bekasi and Bogor, and in Garut and Kuningan in West Java.
Unfortunately, according to Restaria, the government – starting with the President and ministers and down to law enforcement agencies and regional administrations – had also contributed to the escalation of violence towards religious minorities. "They legitimized the attacks or turned blind eyes to the assaults," she said.
LBH recommended the government show its commitment to upholding the law and human rights and maintain principle of equality before the law.