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Constitutional Justice Saldi Isra delivering keynote lecture for the Law Faculty of the Pancasila University, Monday (19/7/2021) virtually. Photo by Humas MK/Ifa.

Monday, July 19, 2021 | 21:10 WIB

JAKARTA, Public Relations—Constitutional Justice Saldi Isra delivered a keynote lecture on “The Constitutional Court’s Procedural Law” for the Law Faculty of the Pancasila University on Monday morning, July 19, 2021. The lecture was part of the Freedom to Learn: Independent Campus (Merdeka Belajar: Kampus Merdeka/MBKM) policy and the Independent Campus Competition Program (PKKM).

Justice Saldi talked about global legal developments as well as the judicial review that started in the US. “So, this authority of the Constitutional Court in [Indonesia], or of the Supreme Court in the US, to review laws against the Constitution, began from the practices in the US,” he explained before Pancasila University Law Faculty Dean Eddy Pratomo, senior researcher Pan Mohamad Faiz from the Constitutional Court, and the participants.

He said that from Marbury v. Madison, the US Constitution didn’t have any clause that granted explicit authority to the Supreme Court to review the constitutionality of any law. Justice Saldi believes the practice of judicial review in the US began with judicial activism.

“So, the justices believed something must be done outside the text of the Constitution because [they had] the obligation and responsibility to carry out their oath of office as US supreme justices,” he explained.

Meanwhile, in Indonesia, Justice Saldi added, when the Constitution was first drafted there was a debate on the judiciary—it was proposed that the Supreme Court be given an authority to review the constitutionality of laws against the Constitution.

“Yamin and Hatta at the time believed that an independent judiciary must mean that there is space for the judiciary to correct regulations under the legislation,” he said.

Justice Saldi explained that Article 24 of the 1945 Constitution stresses that the judicial power shall constitute an independent power to hold a judicature in order to uphold law and justice. The Constitutional Court is one of the executors of this judicial power.

Article 24C paragraphs (1) and (2) of the 1945 Constitution stipulates that the Constitutional Court has the authority to review laws against the Constitution, to decide on authority disputes between state institutions, to decide on the dissolution of political parties, to decide on disputes over general election results, and to decide on the House’s opinion on an alleged violation of law committed by the president and/or vice president.

Justice Saldi also explained how the constitutional justices work. When a petition has been registered and sent to the chief justice by the chief registrar, the chief justice will determine the panel of justices that will preside over the case. “The chief justice will appoint three justices as a panel to review the preliminary petition,” he explained.

The panel is determined based on each of the justice’s case distribution. “The chief justice will observe the number of cases is being handled by Justice A, Justice B. [The case] will be given to the justice with fewer cases,” he explained.

Writer           : Utami Argawati
Editor          : Nur R.
Translator     : Yuniar Widiastuti (NL)

Translation uploaded on 7/21/2021 12:53 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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