Accelerate Legislation, DPR Takes Over Initiative for Civil Procedure Law Bill

Illustration of the working meeting of the DPR Commission III (Nailin/VOI)

Commission III of the DPR officially designated the Draft Law on Civil Procedure as a parliamentary initiative. This decision was taken to cut the compass of the bureaucratic script, which is often stuck in the long coordination process between ministries if it is submitted through the government door.

The Chairman of Commission III of the DPR, Habiburokhman, explained that this shift in initiative was a tactical step to accelerate the duration of legislation. In the drafting mechanism, the proposal from the DPR will only produce one inventory list of problems (DIM) from the government.

On the other hand, if the government proposes it, DIM will swell because it involves many ministries with different sectoral interests.

Civil law events require strict synchronization so as not to overlap with judicial authority. Through the DPR initiative, the process of technical debate within the executive can be trimmed, so that the focus of discussion directly shifts to the substance of more modern and adaptive civil law enforcement.

"We agree that this law is a DPR initiative proposal. If it comes from the government, the process will take much longer because the number of DIMs will certainly be more," said Habiburokhman as quoted from the DPR website, Sunday, January 25.

The government, through Deputy Minister of Law Edward Omar Sharif Hiariej, welcomed this step. In addition to the Civil Procedure Law, the government also entrusted attention to a number of crucial legislative agendas that are mandated by law, such as the Death Penalty Implementation Bill and the Narcotics and Psychotropic Substances Bill.

This agreement marks a joint commitment to update Indonesia's formal law, which has been considered outdated. With the establishment of the status of the DPR initiative, the draft bill will be processed immediately according to the applicable legal mechanism, while still opening up space for enrichment of material from academics and legal practitioners.