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n alliance of the country'€™s indigenous communities called on President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono to revoke a 2013 decree by the forestry minister that obliged indigenous people to provide official documents to claim their customary lands.

The Indigenous Peoples'€™ Alliance of the Archipelago (AMAN) said the decree contradicted the Constitutional Court'€™s decision on customary forests.

AMAN secretary-general Abdon Nababan said the decree showed the government did not take the rights of indigenous people seriously despite their crucial roles in protecting the country'€™s forests from destruction.

'€œThe ministry should revoke the decree immediately as it contradicts the Constitutional Court decision. Indigenous people don'€™t have official documents to prove that land and forests belong to them since they have been living on them for hundreds of years,'€ Abdon said in Jakarta on Monday.

The Constitutional Court ruled in May last year to scrap the word '€œstate'€ from Article 1 of the 1999 Forestry Law, which says '€œcustomary forests are state forests located in the areas of custom-based communities'€. It also ruled the government had to recognize indigenous communities'€™ ownership of customary forests, saying that '€œindigenous peoples have the right to own and exploit their customary forests to meet their daily needs.'€

The ruling was seen as a victory for indigenous people who have long had their rights denied by the state.

However, the ministerial decree has been seen as a repudiation of that victory.

'€œThis decree shows the government is not consistent in uphold-ing the law and protect rights. We want the President to come to the rescue by issuing a decree to render the ministerial decree void,'€ he said.

Data from AMAN shows 143 cases of violations against the rights of the indigenous people occurred in the archipelago last year, three times more than the previous year.

The Pagu and Sawai tribe in North Maluku, the Berbay tribe in Papua, the Barambang Kakute tribe in South Sulawesi, the Karonsie in North Sulawesi and the Dayak Ngaju in Central Kalimantan were among the victims.

National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) commissioner Sandra Moniaga said the President and Forestry Minister Zulkifli Hasan had failed to take corrective action on indigenous communities on agrarian rights.

'€œThe government needs to acknowledge the human rights of indigenous people are violated once their access to food and livelihood are taken. We'€™re going to continue to monitor this issue since we have not seen genuine recognition [of the court'€™s decision],'€ she added.

Noer Fauzi Rahman from the Sajogyo Institute, an agrarian study center, said the government needed to set up a task force or special body to gather data on customary forests.

Data collected by the task force could be shared with the forestry, home and social ministries, the National Land Agency (BPN), the Geospatial Information Agency (BIG) and other relevant institutions.

Forestry Ministry secretary-general Hadi Daryanto defended the decree, saying legal documents were required to avoid false claims made by those who wanted to exploit customary forests.

'€œThis decree is to prevent those with vested interests from controlling customary forests. It'€™s concrete action to prevent people from violating the rights of indigenous people that we protect,'€ Hadi said.