Jakarta – The Indonesian government praises its parliament’s move to resume the deliberation of a bill against sexual harassment on Tuesday (18/1), after six years without any progress.
“This is a form of joint commitment between the government and the House Representatives to immediately legalized the sexual violence bill as an adequate legal umbrella that will provide protection for victims of sexual violence,” said the Chief of Staff to the President Moeldoko, during a press conference at the Bina Graha building, Jakarta, Tuesday (11/1).
On the same day during the 12th plenary meeting, the House Speaker Puan Maharani assured the anti-sexual harassment bill as one of the priority draft laws that will be passed no later than Feb. 18.
According to Moeldoko, the government through the Ministry of Law and Human Rights, Women Empowerment and Child Protection Ministry, along with the Task Force for the acceleration the anti-sexual harassment bill would help to assist the House in concluding the legislative process of the bill.
“The Task Force, especially, will conduct a study on the problem inventory list (DIM) items of the bill by involving all related stakeholders and the public,” said Moeldoko.
Moeldoko also ensured there would not be any overlapping articles as the bill was collaboratively discussed by multiple ministries/institutions with an open public participation.
The Executive Office of the President also held a ministerial-level Coordination Meeting to discuss steps to accelerate the legislative process of the bill that has been stalled since 2016.
The bill came up as a response to rising public concern over the country’s lack of adequate laws to try cases of sexual abuse. According to The National Commission on Violence Against Women, there were 4,500 reports of sexual harassment against women during January to September period last year.
The bill was first initiated by the Commission in 2012 and a formal process to introduce a draft law began in 2016, but progress stalled due to resistance from conservative groups.
