Chief Justice Suhartoyo (center) opening the third hearing for Case No. 64/PUU-XXIV/2026 on the Basic Agrarian Law 1960, Thursday (5/7/2026). Photo by MKRI/Ifa.

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JAKARTA (MKRI) — The Constitutional Court held the third hearing for the material judicial review of Basic Agrarian Law No. 5 of 1960 (UUPA) on Thursday, May 7, 2026. The hearing for the petition filed by Ariyanto Zalukhu, Desimeni Larosa, Christina W. Zega, Masnidarti Harefa, and Vendy Setiawan (Petitioners I-V) was supposed to examine the House of Representatives’ (DPR) and the Government’s testimonies.

However, the House and the Government requested that the hearing for Case No. 64/PUU-XXIV/2026be postponed. “The agenda this afternoon was supposed to be examining the House’s and the Government’s testimonies. However, both requested a postponement due to unpreparedness. Therefore, we the constitutional justices give [both] another opportunity on Monday, May 19, 2026 at 13:30 WIB to hear the House and the Government,” Chief Justice Suhartoyo stated.

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At the preliminary hearing on Friday, February 20, Vendy Setiawan, representing the Petitioners, explained that Petitioner I is a member of a customary law community who controls, manages, and utilizes customary land as his living space, obtained and inherited for generations based on customary law recognized within his community. Such land has not been given a land title certificate. The absence of a certificate is not due to the absence of rights, but rather structural factors such as economic limitations, limited access to land registration services, minimal state assistance, and the continued operation of customary land tenure systems that have long been socially and historically recognized.

However, the Petitioners believe Article 19 paragraph (1) of the Basic Agrarian Law, which mandates land registration to obtain legal certainty, has placed the customary land controlled by Petitioner I in a vulnerable position. Normatively, unregistered land is positioned as land without legal certainty. Meanwhile, Petitioners II through IV are the lawful heirs of owners of customary land legally acquired by the Petitioners’ parents through sale and purchase deeds dated August 6, 1956; January 25, 1958; and October 7, 1969. Some of these deeds were executed before the enactment of the Law a quo and some after. The land has been physically managed for a very long period without registration or issuance of certificates. However, in 2023 and 2025, certain members of the Nias Regency DPRD (Regional Legislative Council) and civil servants at the Gunungsitoli City Office claimed to possess land title certificates over approximately ±5,000 m² of the Petitioners’ land and constructed buildings that factually overlap with land long controlled and managed by the Petitioners’ families.

As a direct consequence of the enforcement of the norm a quo, the Petitioners have suffered real and actual constitutional losses, including: loss of control and utilization of customary land that constitutes the families’ source of livelihood; deprivation of property rights and housing rights as guaranteed by Article 28H paragraph (4) of the 1945 Constitution; and loss of legal certainty and fair legal protection as guaranteed by Article 28D paragraph (1) of the 1945 Constitution, because certificates are positioned as absolute proof without room to prove pre-existing rights.

Meanwhile, Petitioner V is an Indonesian citizen who once assisted administrative activities at a land office as a volunteer, and therefore was not equipped with legal authority, formal administrative responsibility, or institutional protection from the state. However, the absence of regulation regarding state responsibility in Article 19 of the Basic Agrarian Law has resulted in the burden of state administrative failures being unlawfully shifted to individual citizens, including Petitioner V. Thus, the institutional responsibility of the State has transformed into a personal burden on citizens without legal basis.

In their petitum, the Petitioners request the Court to: “Declare Article 19 paragraph (1) of Law No. 5 of 1960 concerning Basic Agrarian Principles (State Gazette of the Republic of Indonesia of 1960 No. 104, Supplement to State Gazette No. 2043) conditionally unconstitutional, insofar as the phrase ‘to ensure legal certainty by the Government’ is not interpreted as: ‘The Government’s obligation to conduct land registration to ensure legal certainty must be interpreted as an active obligation of the State to guarantee the material accuracy of physical and juridical data in land registration, to bear legal responsibility for every error and administrative defect arising from the implementation of land registration, and not to disregard the validity of rights that have historically and sociologically existed, including the rights of customary law communities as well as customary land and long-held land that have been physically controlled and inherited from generation to generation.’” 

Explore case No. 64/PUU-XXIV/2026 (in Indonesian).

Author         : Sri Pujianti
Editor          : N. Rosi
PR               : Fauzan F.
Translator     : Yuniar Widiastuti (NL)

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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