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Deputy Chief Constitutional Justice Aswanto closing the socialization program to improve citizens\' awareness of constitutional rights for professional organizations on Friday (20/9/2019) in Sentul, Bogor. Photo by Humas MK/Hidayat Sabar.

SENTUL, Public Relations of the Constitutional Court—Deputy Chief Constitutional Justice Aswanto said that being a good citizen is not difficult. "What exactly is a good citizen? According to our country\'s standards, good citizens are those who carry out their rights and obligations as outlined in our Constitution," he said while closing the socialization program to improve citizens\' awareness of constitutional rights for professional organizations on Friday (20/9/2019) in Sentul, Bogor.

Justice Aswanto added, one of the rights of citizens is to review laws against the Constitution if their constitutional rights are harmed. In accordance with Article 24C of the 1945 Constitution, when Indonesian citizens feel disadvantaged by the enactment of a law or norms in the law, they can file an objection to the Constitutional Court. 

"What is the mechanism? [They] can submit a petition for judicial review to the Constitutional Court. According to Article 51C of the Constitutional Court Law, all citizens who feel their constitutional rights are violated may submit a petition for judicial review of the norms with the hope, if thepetition is granted, the constitutional loss or potential loss can be lost," Justice Aswanto explained. 

Discussing Pancasila in Indonesia, he said, "Looking back on high school subjects, I most often protested to my father, who was a teacher. My father said Pancasila was native to Indonesia. I criticized, is Pancasila actually in bahasa Indonesia, Malay, Bugis, Javanese, or Sanskrit? My father said Pancasila originated from Sanskrit. Semantically, Pancasila is indeed from Sanskrit," Justice Aswanto said. 

Young Aswanto insisted that Pancasila was not native to Indonesia. Then his father emphasized that what was contained in Pancasila was the culture of the Indonesian nation although Pancasila was semantically derived from Sanskrit.

Meanwhile, Head of the Pancasila and Constitution Education Center Kurniasih Panti Rahayu said that the Constitutional Court is formed during the Reform era after an amendment to the 1945 Constitution. The Constitutional Court was intended as part of the structuring of the constitutional system by implementing the Reform agenda. "The Court is very appreciative of the presence of 79 professional organizations present at this event through questions, statements, suggestions, and criticisms related to the organization of the event held by the Court," she said.

Kurniasih added that this program was held as an effort by the Constitutional Court to uphold the values of the Pancasila and the Constitution. "Professionals in their respective fields are one of the stakeholders who have an important role in the national legal development agenda. This activity is an effort made by the Constitutional Court to build a good legal culture, as a way to implement legal democracy," said Kurniasih. 

Chairperson of the Indonesian Cadastre Survey Expert Society Bambang Gatot Nugroho revealed his pride and nervousness prior to joining the program. "When we were first contacted by the Constitutional Court, we honestly said that besides being proud, there was also fear. We have always considered the Constitutional Court a very tall ivory tower with a ray of authority," said Bambang. 

However, after participating in the program, he found that Constitutional Court of the Republic of Indonesia is a modern, egalitarian, very open institution. Even the Constitutional Court through its website is very open to provide information as needed by the justice seekers.

"Besides, the Court is very open to accept criticism and suggestions from the participants. Also when we [first listened to the presentations], [they] were actually related to the Constitution, which at first seemed boring, but packaged in such a way as to be [interesting]," said Bambang. (Nano Tresna Arfana/NRA)

Translated by: Yuniar Widiastuti

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