Equivalent: Restorative Justice Without Rules Vulnerable To Transactional

Head of the Board of Directors of the Equivalent Institute, Hendardi. (BETWEEN)

JAKARTA - Chair of the Setara Institute Hendardi is of the opinion that the recent restorative justice approach by the Police and the Attorney General's Office is vulnerable to becoming a transactional instrument if there are no clear provisions.

"The application of restorative justice without clear provisions and accountable implementation can indeed be vulnerable and become a transactional instrument," Hendardi said in Jakarta as quoted by Antara, Wednesday, January 26.

This concern was also reminded by the National Police Chief General Listyo Sigit Prabowo so that restorative justice does not become a transactional event. "The next job is how the National Police will control the implementation of this approach, so that it does not become a negotiation room for litigants and ensures that its implementation is selective, fair and accountable," he stressed.

Meanwhile, in the Attorney General's Office, which also has its own rules for restorative justice, it can be interpreted as a correction to the steps taken by the police who have already carried out the investigation process of a case, even though it can be resolved with a restorative justice approach.

As the controller of prosecution policy, according to the dominus litis principle, he added, the role of the Prosecutor's Office is very strategic to ensure that the overflow of cases from the police is not something that is taken for granted.

"Thus, the application of restorative justice in the Prosecutor's Office contributes significantly to strengthening the criminal justice system," said Hendardi.

To strengthen the application of restorative justice, he said, a number of regulations need to be drafted, pending a more robust arrangement as has been planned for adoption in the Draft Criminal Procedure Code.

"The application of the principle of restorative justice does not rely solely on the discretion of the National Police Chief or the Attorney General, but must be guided by agreed measures, so that abusive potentials from this approach can be avoided," he said.

The National Police and the Attorney General's Office previously released the performance of mainstreaming a "restorative justice" (RJ) approach in handling criminal cases.

The National Police released 11,811 cases resolved with a restorative justice approach throughout 2021. Meanwhile, the AGO released 53 cases throughout January 2022 which were also resolved with the same approach.

According to this human rights activist, the steps taken by these two law enforcement institutions are one of the efforts to deal with the acute problem of overcapacity in prisons, due to the orientation of law enforcement that focuses on retributive goals, namely justice in the form of retaliation that leads to punishment.

"Similar efforts were encouraged by various groups to formulate a regulation at the level of a Presidential Regulation on the Reorientation of Criminal Case Investigations in the Police, but to this day it has not been completed," said Hendardi.