Law Page Create Work Continues To Change, Legal Experts: There Can Be No Reduction And Addition

Illustration - demonstration of the Work Creation Bill in Central Jakarta, October (Muhammad Iqbal / VOI)

JAKARTA - An expert in constitutional law from Andalas University, Feri Amsari, considers that a law that has been passed must not add or reduce the legal text that has been passed.

The typing process needs to adjust to the standard format regulated in Law Number 12 of 2011 and Law Number 15 of 2019 concerning the formation of statutory regulations.

"Whatever it is according to the law, there should be no reduction or addition of articles in the ratification stage except for clearical errors or typos. But how can typos increase the number of pages," said Feri when talking to VOI.

Therefore, the reasons for changing pages in the Manuscript of the Job Creation Law cannot be accepted with common sense. Because, this indicates that the Job Creation Law is problematic and was made carelessly.

Apart from that, he finds it difficult to believe the government's statement about the absence of a changed substance in the legislation despite the addition of the manuscript pages. Moreover, the public cannot confirm the veracity of this statement because all drafts of the manuscripts in circulation are deemed not to come from official sources.

"It is impossible if nothing is reduced and added then there is so much swelling of the yard," he said.

Feri suspects that this law is not only problematic because it contains efforts to centralize it to neglect the environment, but because of many other problems in it.

"So, this is the formal or the procedure for its formation is problematic and the material or content of the law is also problematic," he said.

It is known, the manuscript of the Omnibus Law on Cipta Kerja has undergone several changes. At the beginning of the discussion, this manuscript totaled 1,208 pages. Furthermore, when it was passed on Monday, October 5, the manuscript was reduced to 905 pages. Then after being passed, changes occurred again. There are two manuscripts with a different number of pages, namely 1,052 pages and 1,035 pages.

Furthermore, when it was delivered from the DPR to President Jokowi, the manuscript changed again to 812 pages. However, this is not the last change, when submitted to PP Muhamaddiyah, the text of the Copyright Law was added by 375 pages, bringing the total to 1,187 pages.

In this latest manuscript, it is not just the addition of pages that are in the spotlight. The loss of one article in the law, namely Article 46 concerning the Regulatory Body for the Distribution of Oil and Gas, was in the spotlight even though it was claimed that the DPR and the palace would not change the substance of this law.

This is because Article 46 is abolished because the DPR RI Working Committee (Panja) actually did not accept the proposal and chose to abolish it. It's just that, instead of deleting, the DPR RI Legislation Body (Baleg) still wrote the article in the manuscript submitted to President Jokowi.

Coordinating Minister for the Economy Airlangga Hartarto asked the public not to continue discussing the issue of changing the number of pages on the manuscript of the Job Creation Law, which is currently waiting for President Joko Widodo (Jokowi) to sign it. This is because the addition or subtraction of pages that have occurred so far is claimed due to differences in writing formats, the number of letters used, and the size of the paper.

"We don't need to be fixated on the number of pages. Because the pages depend on the type of paper, for example A4, F4. Roman, non-Roman, plus 14 fonts, 12 fonts," said Airlangga in an event entitled 4 Coordinating Ministers in One Stage: Dialogue One. Jokowi-Ma'ruf year that was broadcast on TVRI, Sunday night, October 25.