Yusril Ihza Mahendra as expert for the Petitioners in the judicial review hearing of Law Number 18 of 2003 on Advocates on Monday (17/12) in the Plenary Courtroom of the Constitutional Court. Photo by Humas MK/Ifa.

The organization formed in accordance with Article 32 paragraphs (3) and (4) of the law is only the Indonesian Advocates Association (Peradi), while other advocate organizations that emerged later are not formed based on the article. This was conveyed by Yusril Ihza Mahendra as the expert for the Petitioners in a follow-up judicial review hearing of Law Number 18 of 2003 on Advocates on Monday (17/12) in the Plenary Courtroom of the Constitutional Court.

Regarding the case registered as Number 35/PUU-XVI/2018, Yusril asserted that the Court in Decision 14/PUU-IV/2016 in the legal considerations declared Peradi as the only advocate professional organization. Peradi, Yusril added, was established by eight advocate organizations within two years of the issuance of the Advocate Law. In this statement, Yusril compared the changes in the Advocate Law to the Law on the Office of Notary Public, which was amended at the initiative of the Government with Law No. 2 of 2014, while the Government and the Parliament did not take the initiative to change the Advocate Law so multiple interpretations continued.

"Because [of the absence of] initiative by the Government and House of Representatives, this multi-interpretations continued, so it would be better if the Constitutional Court make a decision to end this," Yusril responded to the petition submitted by advocates Bahrul Ilmi Yakup, Shalil Mangara Sitompul, Gunadi Handoko, Rynaldo P. Batubara, Ismail Nganggon, and advocate candidate Iwan Kurniawan.

According to Yusril, in the legal considerations the Constitutional Court needs to complete its affirmation through legal considerations of previous decisions that had expressly stated that Peradi was the only advocate professional organization. Basically, Peradi is an independent state organ, so the multiple interpretations of the law must be eliminated and the the organization\'s incarnation should be singular.

Given Mandate

Ikadin as the Relevant Party also presented Maruar Siahaan as an expert, who gave a statement that if an advocate organization had the function to exercise state power, then the existence of that power must be visible. According to Maruar, when advocate organizations are given power, its coordination and responsibility to the state must be visible. One manifestation of this is the issuance of a decree. "So, the law enforcement is consistent in enforcing law by inherently providing legal uncertainty in this Advocate Law. If Peradi is declared a single advocate organ with a transition, then the other 8 organs [should be dissolved]," Maruar explained before the hearing chaired by Chief Justice Anwar Usman, in the presence of the other eight constitutional justices.

The Petitioners had previously claimed that they did not have legal certainty of legal and constitutional advocate organizations to exercise the authority set forth in the Advocate Law. They argued that the norm of the phrase "advocate organizations" as set forth in the Advocate Law was currently multi-interpretive, which allowed certain parties such as the Congress of Indonesian Advocates (KAI) and the Association of Indonesian Advocates of the Republic of Indonesia (Peradri), or the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Indonesia, to provide different interpretations or other interpretations that are unconstitutional because they do not conform to the original intent or teleological purpose of the formation of the norm of the phrase "advocate organizations" as regulated by the Advocate Law. This can be explained by the interpretation of KAI in relation to advocate organizations in that the one entitled to exercise the authority set forth in the Advocate Law is "the Congress of Indonesian Advocates." KAI in this case intends to gather the Indonesian advocates in a single organization as mandated by the Advocate Law ex Article 10 letter a of the Deed of Establishment of the Organization of Congress of Indonesian Advocates.

Before closing the session, Justice Anwar reminded that the session would continue on Thursday, January 10, 2019 to hear the testimony of witnesses and experts for Ferari. (Sri Pujianti/LA)