Constitutional Justice Arief Hidayat speaking at the Constitution Awareness Program for Transformational Teachers Batch II virtually, Tuesday (3/29/2022). Photo by Humas MK/Teguh.

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Wednesday, March 30, 2022 | 15:44 WIB

JAKARTA, Public Relations—The ontology of Indonesia is its unity, so we need to understand the values within Pancasila and whoever lead and manage the country should uphold Pancasila values, said Constitutional Justice Arief Hidayat opening his presentation at the Constitution Awareness Program for Transformational Teachers Batch II on Tuesday, March 29, 2022 virtually from the Constitutional Court building in Jakarta. Some 400 teachers of kindergarten up to senior high school levels participated in event virtually, which was the result of collaboration between the Constitutional Court (MK) and the Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology.

He said that in order to safeguard Indonesia and Pancasila, we must dedicate ourselves to the state goal of protecting all Indonesian people, which is enshrined in the Preamble to the 1945 Constitution. He observed that, as referred to in the Preamble, “By the grace of the Almighty God and motivated by a noble intention…,” Indonesia was founded as a state and nation not only on the people’s unity but also their noble intention and the grace of God. Thus, thanks to all of those, the free nation Indonesia was realized.

Indonesia’s heterogeneity, he said, is a perfect match for the Pancasila ideology. Pancasila binds it with a common motivation to become a free, united, sovereign, just, and prosperous country.

“This is the formulation that our founders built, which we must continue to pass on to the next generations so that this country will be a great country in the world with its ideology that is typical of the people,” Justice Arief said.

Consensus

Next, former chief justice of the Constitutional Court in 2003-2008 Jimly Asshiddiqie encouraged all transformational teachers to understand the constitution and constitutionalism in the state administration. He said a constitution is the highest consensus a nation that is used as guidelines in carrying out state life. It is constructed as a political, economic, and social consensus that also contains arrangements on the shared ideals in the state administration, as well as rules that connect state organs and regulates organizational relations within the state.

“So, in a modern state, the constitution is a recognized ideal state concept. In practice, there are constitutional countries that have a constitution text while some do not. For example, Britain does not have a written constitution, but the Magna Carta is still recognized as the country’s constitution. Brunei Darussalam [is similar]. So, only 3% of countries do not have a written constitution but declare themselves as constitutional democracies,” said Jimly in a virtual class moderated by Ardiansyah Salim from the Constitutional Court's Pancasila and Constitution Education Center (Pusdik).

In the third session, on the second day of the event, Head of the Public Relations and National Affairs Department Fajar Laksono Soeroso talked about “The State Administration System Based on the 1945 Constitution.” In the fourth session, Radian Salman, a lecturer at Airlangga University of Surabaya talked about “The Guarantee of Citizens’ Constitutional Rights Based on the 1945 Constitution.” He encouraged the transformational teachers to understand the basics of human rights within the Constitution.

Also read: Guarantee of Constitutional Rights Develop Following Citizens’ Needs 

The event took place for four days, Monday-Thursday, March 28-31, 2022, featuring the best speakers and materials in constitutional law. After listening to the presentations, the participants will be instructed on the technique of drafting judicial review petition and to practice writing one. At the end of the event, their work will be evaluated.

Writer        : Sri Pujianti
Editor        : Nur R.
Translator  : Yuniar Widiastuti (NL)

Translation uploaded on 4/11/2022 10:35 WIB

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

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