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Chief Justice Anwar Usman opening a coordination meeting of deans and managers of video conference facilities in 42 universities across Indonesia alongside Secretary-General M. Guntur Hamzah, Wednesday (18/11/2020) from the Constitutional Court. Photo by Humas MK/Ifa.

JAKARTA, Public Relations of the Constitutional Court—Chief Justice Anwar Usman said, since the Constitutional Court was established on August 13, 2003, the Registrar’s Office and Secretariat General of the Constitutional Court have been collaborating with universities across Indonesia. The cooperation was the Court’s effort to instill constitutionalism post-amendment to the 1945 Constitution, said Chief Justice Anwar Usman when he delivered a keynote speech before opening the virtual coordination meeting of deans and managers of video conference facilities in 42 universities across Indonesia on Wednesday, November 18, 2020.

“The selection of [universities] as strategic partners to instill the Constitution was inevitable. The amendment to the 1945 Constitution was the fruit of labor of universities, its commitment to the administration system, which at the time was seen to have needed a reform. It is appropriate that the [universities], agents of change, became strategic partners to Constitutional Court,” he said.

Video Conference 

The collaboration between the Constitutional Court and universities since 2003 have significantly improved public awareness and understanding of the 1945 Constitution, especially after video conference facilities were installed at 42 universities. It has also facilitated access to justice at the Constitutional Court. Video conferencing shows judicial transparency in the Constitutional Court and can be utilized for academia, such as public lectures, academic discussions, seminars, etc.

“Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the use video conference can be optimized. The technology will adapt to the current condition and can be utilized in the resolution of the 2020 concurrent pilkada [regional head election] disputes,” he stressed. Justice Anwar also congratulated Airlangga, Padjajaran, and Pancasakti Tegal Universities for being the best managers of video conference facilities in 2020.

Facilitating Access to Justice

Meanwhile, Deputy Chief Justice Aswanto said that the Constitutional Court was a greenhouse that is transparent to the public. “Through IT support, we hope public participation, especially academics, will be improved. We have started video conferencing from Aceh to Merauke. With technology, information on the administration of our country can be accessed speedily,” he said.

Justice Aswanto added that the Constitutional Court always strived to facilitate access to justice, in accordance with its mission to be modern judiciary. Therefore, it prepared various applications, for example to facilitate online petitions of judicial review and election disputes.

“When we were handling pilkada dispute cases, the communities had grievances, for example, in terms of geography, them being so far from the capital, and the provision on [filing] pilkada dispute [petitions] only after the KPU (General Elections Commission) called the results. In areas far from the capital, the short deadline can be an issue, but with technology and communication as well as the Constitutional Court’s commitment to utilize technology, such issues hopefully will not occur,” he said.

Amid the pandemic, the Court has implemented remote hearings for its judicial review, which has garnered positive response from the public. In this coordination meeting, managers of video conference facilities hopefully would offer suggestions to optimize the use of the facilities, including in the resolution of pilkada dispute cases.

“We hope that in this situation, managers of video conference facilities as our partners can support us optimally so that [we can] protect citizens’ constitutional rights through modern and reliable judiciary,” he concluded.

Transparency

Secretary-General M. Guntur Hamzah said the importance of transparency in the Constitutional Court. He quoted philosopher Jeremy Bentham, “Publicity is the very soul of justice. It is the keenest spur to exertion and the surest of all guards against improbity.” “If we want to modernize [the Court], this philosophy must be upheld by all staff members in order to realize transparent judiciary,” he said in his presentation.

Guntur said that transparency in the judiciary is inevitable. He quoted Amelia Earhart, “The most effective way to do it, is to do it.” “Therefore, in the Constitutional Court, we always stress ICT not only as an acronym for information and communications technology, but [as a means to achieve] integrity and reliability. If we only interpreted technology as a tool, we could be man behind tool, where the tool could be used inappropriately. Therefore, integrity and reliability is an integral part of ICT that is implemented in the Constitutional Court,” he stressed.

He also explained that modern judiciary isn’t limited to ICT, but also to the mindset and culture of the people. He said that the people’s mindset and culture must be oriented toward progress. He also revealed that the Constitutional Court has been developing continuously in order to achieve effectiveness and efficiency, for example by having switched to digital signatures for the past two years.

“Hopefully, the use of digital signatures can be maintained and developed because not only is it accurate, but documents with digital signatures are also easily identified in terms of originality, validity, and authenticity. We believe [the technology] has [OVA] characteristics—original, valid, and authentic—compared to conventional signatures on paper, which is ineffective and inefficient,” he said.

Another change that has occurred in the Court, Guntur added, is the switch from paper to digital copies. Digital documents are easily distributed, without the need for delivery, for example though emails.

“The drastic shift to electronic documents can also save time, so that all units receive documents simultaneously,” he said.

Writer: Nano Tresna Arfana
Editor: Nur R.
Translator: Yuniar Widiastuti (NL)

Translation uploaded on 11/20/2020 16:31 WIB

Disclaimer: The original version of the news is in Indonesian. In case of any differences between the English and the Indonesian version, the Indonesian version will prevail.

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