Religious Court Judges Urged to Undertake Law Reform
Right to left: DJ Badilag Drs. Purwosusilo, SH., MH, Former Chief Justice Prof. Bagir Manan, Chief of Chamber for Religious Court Civil Cases Dr. Andi Syamsu Alam, and moderator Dr. Hasbi Hasan
Jakarta | Badilag.net/english
Indonesia’s religious Court judges are urged to more actively find the law in making court decisions. The finding of law is needed not only to pursue justice but also to stimulate law reform in Indonesia.
Former Chief Justice, Prof. Bagir Manan, raised the above statements on Tuesday (27/8/2013) at Badilag’s office in Jakarta when delivering his speech as the main speaker of legal discussion round 2.
He said that the road to law finding in Islam was wide open through the means of ijtihad, an effort which had even been done hundreds of centuries ago by the Caliph Umar ibn Khattab.
Prof. Bagir added that law finding was mostly done by judges in countries embracing the common law system. However, Indonesian judges who adhere to the civil law system can still perform the finding of law.
.He further stated that religious court judges, who on one hand are tied to the civil law system and on the other hand implement Islamic law, need to perform legal finding if the available legislations are unclear, contradictory to one another, or if legal vacuum is present.
Prof. Bagir also criticized religious court judges who are reluctant to carry out law finding and merely act as the mouthpiece of the law.
Chief of Chamber for religious civil cases at the Supreme Court, Dr. Andi Syamsu Alam, who also attended the discussion, voiced the same push as Prof. Bagir.
“It is time for us to reform Islamic law in Indonesia. Don’t let religious court judges unable to carry out the reform. We must continuously perform Ijtihad,” he said.
Andi claimed a number of ‘new laws’ have been created by religious court judges. Some of them are in the areas of inheritance and marital property cases in which non-Muslim heirs and adopted children were granted the estate through the means of wasiat wajibah (obligatory will), and wives were granted a larger portion of joint marital-property for certain reasons, and other cases.
The second session of legal discussion held regularly by Badilag was attended by nearly 100 participants consisting of Chief Judges and Vice Chief Judges of PTA (High Religious Court), high judges, Chief Judges and Vice Chief Judges of religious courts, and judges from various regions in Indonesia.
The results of this discussion will be covered in the next publication of Majalah Peradilan Agama which can be downloaded freely at www.badilag.net.
(Achmad Cholil)