SBC: Indonesia - Indonesian women’s rights still denied

With this year’s International Women’s Day around the corner, women in this country continue to struggle in a male-dominated world and efforts to protect their rights have been met with opposition from conservative groups.

Data from the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan) said that 119,107 cases of violence against women took place in 2011, up 13 per cent from 105,103 in 2010.

The commission had collected data from 395 partner institutions in 30 provinces and found that sexual harassment against women was one of the biggest problems.

Komnas Perempuan recorded 4,335 cases of sexual harassment in 2011, of which 2,937 occurred in public spaces including public transportation vehicles. The commission recorded 1,751 sexual harassment cases in public spaces in 2010.

"The core problems in violence against women remain unsolved and they are the lack of understanding and appreciation among government officials and policy-makers of how to uphold women’s rights and how to properly treat them when they become victims,” the commission’s chairperson Yuniyanti Chuzaifah said on Wednesday.

Yuniyanti’s assessment of the conditions women face in the country appeared to have been vindicated earlier this week when the House of Representatives’ households affairs body issued a regulation that bans female staff from wearing revealing attire, saying that the measure was taken to prevent immoral conduct.

House Speaker Marzuki Alie said that the regulation was intended to restore the image of the House by preventing sex scandals there.

Marzuki also said that by weaing revealing clothing, women encouraged men to make advances on them.

Marzuki’s statement echoed what Jakarta Governor Fauzi Bowo said late last year when responding to a series of rapes committed against female passengers on public transportation vehicles.

Fauzi advised women against wearing provocative clothing while riding public transportation in order to avoid being raped.

Yuniyanti said that the statement was unfair because it placed the blame on victims of sexual violence, rather than the perpetrators.

Meanwhile, an effort to protect the rights of women by the Constitutional Court has been met with staunch opposition by a number of conservative outfits in the country.

Several Muslim groups including the Indonesian Ulema Council (MUI) and Nahdlatul Ulama’s Muslimat Women’s Group have lashed out at the Constitutional Court’s decision to guarantee that the civil rights of children born out of wedlock should be recognised by their biological father, saying that the ruling would only encourage adultery.

The MUI has said that the ruling could lead many to think that adultery was legal.

Firebrand group Hizbut Tahrir condemned the ruling, saying that the court’s decision was not based on sharia and could encourage adultery.

The Constitutional Court defended its decision on Wednesday in a press conference, saying that the decision was made to protect women from having to bear the burden of raising children, when men should also assume the same responsibility.

"Allowing men to shirk their responsibility would mean that the state is justifying legal injustice ... against women who have to raise and educate their children,” Constitutional Court judge Ahmad Fadlil Sumadi said.

Fadlil said that the ruling was clearly not an effort to legalise adultery, but a step toward upholding women’s and children’s rights.

Rabby Pramudatama

Data from the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan) said that 119,107 cases of violence against women took place in 2011, up 13 percent from 105,103 in 2010.