T

he Attorney General'€™s Office (AGO) announced on Monday that it would no longer delay the executions of six convicts should the Supreme Court reject their case reviews.

The six convicts in question are drug inmates Namaona Denis of Nigeria, Marco Archer Cardoso Moreira of Brazil, Pujo Lestari and Agus Hadi of Indonesia, as well as murder convicts Tan Joni and Gunawan Santoso of Indonesia.

Their executions were postponed last month after they requested the court review their cases.

The deputy attorney general for general crimes, AK Basyuni, said that the Supreme Court would review the cases of the six convicts on Jan. 6 and if the court rejects them then the AGO would go ahead to schedule their executions.

'€œIf rejected, then we hope that we can execute them sometime this month,'€ Basyuni said.

The Constitutional Court scrapped Article 268, Point 3 of the Criminal Law Procedures Code (KUHAP) following a request from former Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) chief Antasari Azhar, who was convicted in a high profile murder case. The article limited convicts to one case review petition.

In a move to challenge the MK ruling, the Supreme Court recently issued a circular letter that grants only one chance for convicts to file a case review, a move that was supported by President Joko '€œJokowi'€ Widodo'€™s administration, which claims that death penalty convicts used their multiple case review rights as a '€œlegal excuse'€ to avoid execution.

The Constitutional Court criticized the Supreme Court for violating the Constitutional Court ruling, saying such a call violated the Constitution because the Constitutional Court is the sole interpreter of the Constitution.

'€œWe can say that should a non-compliance occur, it is a form of disobedience to our ruling and thus a violation to our Constitution,'€ deputy chief justice Arief Hidayat said during an event at the Constitutional Court building on Monday.

Other state institutions, Arief added, could not unilaterally interpret the Constitution because the Constitutional Court was the sole interpreter of the Constitution.

On Saturday, Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Tedjo Edhy Purdijatno also said that multiple case reviews would bring legal uncertainty for law enforcement institutions, such as the AGO, in executing death penalty prisoners.

'€œWhen they hear they are soon to be executed, they suddenly file case review proposals [to the Supreme Court] to delay matters. When will the execution take place if such a situation recurs?'€ Tedjo said.

Chief justice Hamdan Zoelva said the Constitutional Court ruling on case reviews should not lead to legal uncertainty because a case review was an extraordinary legal proceeding.

'€œIf people ask where or when [the criminal case convicts] get legal certainty, the cassation ruling will provide the legal certainty. Later, after the cassation, just proceed with the execution,'€ Hamdan said.

Taufiqurrohman Syahuri, one of the commissioners at the Judicial Commission, said the Supreme Court should have listened first to any input from outsiders, including former justices, before issuing such a circular.

'€œThe Supreme Court should have instead listed requirements for such case reviews: for example, if there is new evidence,'€ he said.

Former Constitutional Court justice Harjono said the circular should be revamped.

'€œIt should regulate the requirements for a more than one case review request, instead of, for example, a requirement to present only new witnesses because a witness who once testified in a hearing was often presented in order to buy time,'€ he said.