Legalize Sexual Violence Bill in Indonesia!
The House of Representative of the Government of Indonesia on 30th June 2020 announced that they would revoked the sexual violence bill from the National Legislation Program Priority 2020, which means the Sexual Violence Bill will not be a national legal basis to protect women and children from discrimination and sexual violence, again, despite strong calls from women’s right activist and public to pass the bill. The Lawmakers in House Commission VIII stated that the bill is "too difficult to talk about right now”
Over years, Indonesia has no legal basis to protect women and children from discrimination and sexual violence. The Criminal Code only covers rape, which defined as "threatened woman to have sex (penetration) with no marital relation" as sexual harassment while in reality women (and children) experienced many other forms of sexual violence. Marital rape, cat calling, groping, etc. happened every single day in Indonesia.
The Sexual Violence Bill has been stalled for around two years now. Every year, the case of sexual violence towards women (and children) are not getting better. National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan) reported that out of 431.471 cases of violence against women in the year 2019, 4.176 were the cases of sexual violence. In 2018, there were 5.509 cases of sexual violence reported. This fact did not cover unreported cases.
The COVID-19 pandemic has also magnifies the number of sexual violence occurred on women and children. Throughout 2020, around January - May, National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan) reported that there were 170 cases of sexual violence in the field of household and 203 cases in the field of community.
Separately, The House of Legislation Body stated that they will include sexual violence bill on the next priority list for 2021 in October which might indicate the law might be or might not be passed on provincial level.
TRIGGER WARNING // Recently, there were sexual violence cases Indonesia that have been trending topic in the internet. Starbucks’ employees arrested for allegedly peeping at a woman customer’ cleavage through CCTV, recorded it, and uploaded it on instagram story. Sadly, the starbucks’ employees were charged under Electronic Information and Transactions Law for spreading videos that violates morality standards, not for sexually harassed a woman customer. A girl allegedly raped by her own cousin, multiple times, got pregnant, and forced to marry him. She then raped again by the father-in-law after giving birth to the baby. A girl, who is a rape survivor, was allegedly raped and sexually abused by the head of Care Center for the Empowerment of Women and Children (P2TP2A) for multiple times.
There is no guarantee that The House of Representative of the Government of Indonesia will pass the bill in the next National Legislation Program Priority 2021. Delaying the sexual violence bill will only add more and more victims. Delaying the sexual violence bill will kill more women and girls. The future of our sisters, daughters, girl friends, mothers, cousins, are in our hand.
Below attached links to change org petition to legalize the sexual violence bill, news according to the house of representative, explanation about the sexual violence bill, and some cases about sexual violence (please pay attention to the trigger warning).
Legalize Sexual Violence Bill, now.