Yasonna: The Criminal Code Regulates The Law That Lives In Society

Minister of Law and Human Rights Yasonna Hamonangan Laoly in the National Seminar "Regarding the Applicability of Laws That Live in Society Based on Law Number 1 of 2023./DOC BETWEEN

JAKARTA - Minister of Law and Human Rights Yasonna Hamonangan Laoly said Law Number 1 of 2023 concerning the Criminal Code (KUHP) regulates the laws that live in society. This was conveyed by Yasonna in the National Seminar for the Implementation of Laws that Live in Society Based on Law Number 1 of 2023 concerning the Criminal Code at the Ministry of Law and Human Rights, Jakarta. "How to combine a separate legal environment between positive law and law that lives in a society that has been known in criminal law as a legal unification system. In this case, only written criminal law applies," Yasonna said online, quoted from Antara, Monday, July 24. According to Yasonna, this needs to be a subject of thought about how the mechanism in adopting customary criminal norms will be outlined in government regulations as further instructions from the implementation of the new Criminal Code. "KUHP can later be implemented by law enforcement officers in the field," said Yasonna. The journey of the Draft Law of the Criminal Code to become a new Criminal Code Law should be considered as a lesson regarding the development of Indonesian criminal law because the birth of the Criminal Code is the fruit of a long wait. Yasonna argued that the idea of forming the national Criminal Code Bill had emerged more than half a century ago during the first national law seminar in Semarang in 1963. After a long time, the Government and the DPR finally passed the Criminal Code Bill into law on December 6, 2022. Although it reaps the pros and cons on several articles that are considered controversial in the new Criminal Code, he said, this law is a legal product made by the nation's children that should be appreciated. The Minister of Law and Human Rights assessed that the ratification of the regulation was a hard work to break away from the legal product of Dutch colonial heritage which is no longer relevant to today's era. He also explained that customary law as an unwritten rule has lived in Indonesian society for a long time. It is undeniable, he continued, that the rules that live in society are considered more able to solve legal problems in the community. For this reason, legal reforms including criminal law are a necessity. This is because the need for justice for society continues to change and one of them must be accommodated by including the legal elements that live in society (the living law). "The law that lives in society is basically a law that is recognized by the community or community groups. This law is born from non-dispute habits," Yasonna explained.

Therefore, he continued, the law that lives in society is a rational view of society about justice, ideal, and the ideals of every member of society. Furthermore, the legal norms that live in society are also part of the formation of law. "The law that lives in society as the basis for determining a person can be punished on the basis of prosecution," he concluded.