T

hrough social media networks, thousands of (mostly young) judges called for a movement to save the Indonesian judiciary last month. The movement, initiated by judge Sunoto of the Aceh Tamiang District Court via a Facebook group called Rencana Peserta Aksi Hakim (Judges Action Plan), aims to save the Supreme Court from the mafia, clean up the judiciary corps, promote judges of integrity and help reform-minded judges prosper.

This movement is timely, following a series of cases plaguing the Supreme Court and the entire judiciary force, including the arrest of Corruption Court judges who were caught accepting bribes in Semarang, the ambush of a judge who was enjoying drugs and lately, the sudden resignation of a Supreme Court justice held responsible for changing a jail sentence for a convicted drug producer.

This moral call has harvested support, if not a positive response, from the public. A number of figures from the Judicial Commission, the Constitutional Court, the House of Representatives and universities have urged the Supreme Court to immediately conduct internal correction and improvement. Pressure is mounting on the court to improve its transparency, uphold justice and pay more attention to the moral integrity and capability of judges.

Public criticism and pessimism toward the country’s judiciary system apparently stem from three major problems facing Indonesian courts: low quality, inconsistency and a lack of moral integrity in judges.

Concerning the first two challenges, the newly-introduced chamber system, which has come into effect since October last year, should have offered an answer. The chamber system aims to improve the quality of judgments and maintain the consistency of verdicts in similar cases. But it seems the Dutch-imported system needs much more time and a stronger commitment to take effect.

In this case, the role of outsiders is needed to help the Supreme Court maintain uniformity of judgments. In New South Wales, for example, this role is played by the local Judicial Commission whose core function is to ensure consistency in handing down sentences. This is crucial since consistency in decisions, according to former chief justice of Australian High Court, CJ Murray Gleeson, is the most important and most difficult part of the administration of justice.

As for moral integrity, which the public perceives as elusive, Indonesian judges need to act to prove their commitment to a clean justice system, something which can only start from themselves. There at least four alternative actions they may take into consideration.

First, the judges have to play a role as a “broom” in their respective offices. Each judge is expected to “clean up” his or her office and prevent any irregularities from occurring. To act as a broom, they have to ensure that they themselves are “clean” before turning their attention to others.

Second, signing an integrity pact. The commitment to a clean judiciary system should be documented as proof in the form of, among others, an integrity pact. Under this pact, for instance, a judge will state his readiness to immediately step down and take punishment once she/he is found guilty of corrupt practices.

Third, playing a whistle blower role against corrupt judges. Rampant bribery and other criminal cases involving judges indicates that judges’ oversight bodies, such as the Judicial Commission and Supreme Court Supervisory Body, need more power to effectively conduct their jobs. Promoting a whistle blowing culture within the judiciary is a feasible solution.

Finally, intervention with judges’ independence, which may come from both internal and external parties, must be put to an end. Judges need legal protection from any form of intervention. A law of anti-contempt of court will help establish an independent judiciary. In this context, the Judicial Commission and Supreme Court should actively push for the enactment of the law.

Despite the challenges and weaknesses, the Supreme Court is not without its achievements. In September 2011, the Central Information Commission named the Supreme Court the most transparent among state institutions dealing with law enforcement and justice. The court is also the sixth most transparent public institution in the country.

Sebastiaan Pompe, an observer from the Netherlands, said in his article (The Jakarta Post, March 29, 2011) that the Supreme Court was the most transparent public institution in the country, given the fact that it had published tens of thousands of court judgments online. The number, Pompe said, far exceeded the verdicts published by the Supreme Courts of the US, the Netherlands and Australia combined over the past decade.

It is true that corrupt judges still exist but it is not fair to judge the judiciary corps based on misconduct committed by a small number of corrupt and immoral judges. There are still many judges who are intelligent, clean and of high integrity.

Corrupt judges must be punished severely, but make sure to give credit and reward to good judges. Let us save clean and progressive judges and protect Indonesian courts for the sake of a respected judiciary corps.

The writer is a judge at the Bekasi Religious Court and LLM candidate at Melbourne Law School, the University of Melbourne, Australia. The opinions expressed are his own.