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Jakarta Post

A not-so-righteous body

“Strengthen democracy, enhance good governance and the rule of law, and promote and protect human rights and fundamental freedoms, with due regard to the rights and responsibilities of the Member States of ASEAN

The Jakarta Post
Fri, July 24, 2009

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A not-so-righteous body

“Strengthen democracy, enhance good governance and the rule of law, and promote and protect human rights and fundamental freedoms, with due regard to the rights and responsibilities of the Member States of ASEAN.”

So goes one of the opening articles of the ASEAN Charter on the basic purpose of the 10-member regional grouping which in just over a fortnight commemorates its 42nd anniversary. Since its inception the grouping — which brings together Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam — has evolved from a congregation of autocrats, a governments’ club for economic networking, to an organization growingly more aware of grassroots demands but still far from people-oriented.

From the four-decade perspective of ASEAN’s history, the adoption of the Terms of Reference (TOR) for the creation of an ASEAN Inter-Governmental Commission on Human Rights is a giant leap for an organization more accustomed to protecting the impunity of state power. However from a 21st century standpoint, the TOR was another example of how virtuous intent was consigned by political appeasement.

After years of good intentions, volumes of study, endless civil society lobby and countless hours of idle talk, the end result was an anticlimax. Short of saying that the outcome was disappointing, we can say the results of the ASEAN Meeting in Phuket on human rights mechanisms were far from a victory.

In other words, if this was the best that ASEAN could come up with then it was about 20 years too late.

The set mechanisms fail to fully conform to international instruments and are far behind other regions in terms of commitments to redress human rights concerns. Regions such as the Americas and Africa have gone much further by establishing human rights courts within regional frameworks.

On the equally important aspects of “promotion” and “protection” which this new body should serve, ASEAN ministers deferred to the former while almost neglecting the latter, thereby effectively sustaining the impunity of the state in its relationship with ASEAN citizens.

Whatever the contrived argument — be it that the new body is in an “evolutionary process” or that outcome was necessary for consensus — the failure of a minimal explicit protection of human rights within the TOR is a copout to the inherent values of the ASEAN Charter.

We acknowledge the hard work of Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda who, by all accounts, pushed for more progressive tenets to be included in the final TOR. It was a worthy effort that reflects our standpoint as the world’s third democracy.

Despite the severe shortcomings of the current mechanism, all has not been lost, yet. Tweaks and adjustments are viable options within the new framework. We should ensure that representation to the commission is an open process. Perhaps there should be a national process whereby candidates are vetted by civil society groups, approved by the legislature and then appointed by the president.

There should also be follow-up declarations in the near future, embodying the original spirit of the human rights body, so the evolution of this new commission is not weighed down by legalese and political compromise.

We, as a civil society, must demand and wrestle for this. We cannot linger like beggars awaiting the good offices of government to drop a pithy penny to acknowledge our inalienable rights.

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