Fitria Sumarni as the attorney after attending second hearing of judicial review of Blasphemy Law on Monday (11/9) in the Plenary Hall of the Constitutional Court. Photo by PR/Ifa.

Ahmadiyah adherents who requested material review of regulations prohobiting religious deviations stipulated in Law Number 1/PNPS/1965 on Prevention, Diffusion, and/or Blasphemy (Blasphemy Law) revised the petition. The second hearing of case Number 56/PUU-XV/2017 was held on Monday (11/9) in the Plenary Hall of the Constitutional Court.

In the petition revision read out by Fitria Sumarni as attorney, the Petitioners, who originally were 25 people came down to 9 people divided into 5 groups, all of whom embraced Ahmadiyya. The Petitioners argued that the norms being reviewed make it difficult for them to perform religious worship. In addition, the Petitioners claimed that their constitutional rights were violated by the enactment of Articles 1, 2, and 3 of the Blasphemy Law. According to them, the Joint Decree of the Minister of Religious Affairs, the Attorney General, and the Minister of Home Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia concerning Warning and Order to Adherents, Members and/or Leading Members of the Indonesian Ahmadiyya Jama\'at (JAI) and Members of the General Public (Joint Decree of 3 Ministers) drafted based on the three articles had caused them damages. The Joint Decree of 3 Ministers established Ahmadiyya as a cult.

The Petitioners were directly affected and their right to religion and to worship were restricted and suppressed because of the joint decree. There was a domino effect in the lives of Ahmadiyya adherents, for example the Petitioners can no longer worship in the mosques they built because they were burned or sealed, they cannot record their marriage in Religious Affairs Office (KUA), and they were even evicted from their residences.

Therefore, the Petitioners requested that Articles 1, 2, and 3 of the Blasphemy Law be declared contrary to the 1945 Constitution with constitutional conditions, in particular Article 28C paragraph (2), Article 28D paragraph (1), Article 28E paragraphs 1) and (2), Article 28I paragraph (2), Article 28G paragraph (1), and Article 29 paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution and having no binding legal force as long as it is interpreted to be against the citizens of the Ahmadiyya community who only worship in their places of worship internally and not in public.

(Lulu Anjarsari/lul/Yuniar Widiastuti)