The House of Representatives corruption court bill special committee, which is already burdened with an obligation to pass the bill into law by September, has received another bill from the government for deliberation.
"The government, out of nowhere, submitted a bill called the *corruption bill,' in July. Of course, this is forcing us in the committee to re-synchronize our work on the corruption court bill, which is still being processed, with deliberations of the new bill," the head of the committee, Dewi Asmara from the Golkar Party, said.
"Both of the bills relate to one another. So, synchronization between them is of utmost importance," Dewi said.
The deliberation of both bills would begin when the House reconvenes after its recess, she said.
"The House will resume on Aug. 14. From that date on, we will try to synchronize the bills and pass them into law. Hopefully we can do that before the end of our term in September," she said.
"So far, we have already established a working committee to work on the corruption court bill. That committee is a lot smaller than the special committee, so we can be more focussed. As for the corruption bill, we have yet to look into it," she said.
In 2005, the Constitutional Court ruled that the Corruption Court violated the 1945 Constitution because it was established under the 2002 Law on the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), instead of the law on judicial powers.
Anticorruption groups have urged the House to move faster to pass the corruption court bill into law, because the Constitutional Court has ruled that a new law on the Corruption Court must be enacted by December 2009 or the Corruption Court will be dissolved.
If that happens, the Corruption Court will be forced to hand over cases under its investigation to district courts, in which alleged corruptors are more often freed than sent to prison, Indonesia Corruption Watch (ICW) says.
The House was already burdened with the deliberation of several priority bills, including the corruption court bill and state secrecy bill, before the government issued the corruption bill only two months before the end of the current legislators' tenure.
Commencing its term in office in October 2004, the House, through its national legislation program, targeted to pass 284 new laws, but has endorsed only around half of this target so far.
The latest bill to be passed was the legislative body composition bill, which then became the law on the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR), House of Representatives, Regional Representatives Council (DPD) and Regional Legislative Council (DPRD).
Around 54 of the 284 bills have remained untouched, while others were currently being processed, House secretary-general Nining Indah Sari told The Jakarta Post recently.
Any funds spent financing the deliberation of bills would be wasted if the current House failed to pass them because, according to state regulations, the next House must start from scratch on deliberations of any bills.
On average, the cost of producing a law could be between Rp 1.5 billion (US$150,000) and Rp 2 billion, per bill, House Speaker Agung Laksono said. (hdt)
