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New minister for women's empowerment ‘could lead’ fight for urgent reforms
At the Cabinet’s inauguration Jokowi said Bintang was responsible for “strengthening the role of women in entrepreneurship, eliminating child labor and overcoming violence against women and children.”
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Women's Empowerment and Child Protection Minister I Gusti Ayu Bintang Darmawati, better known as Bintang Puspayoga, greets the press during the announcement of the Indonesia Onward Cabinet in Jakarta on Wednesday. (JP/Seto Wardhana)
T
he new minister for women’s empowerment and child protection is in a good position to lead continued efforts to raise the legal marrying age and to get the sexual violence eradication bill passed into law, human rights activists have said.
These two measures, the activists claim, are urgent steps needed for women and girls, to follow up earlier actions by the government and the House of Representatives in the 2014-2019 period.
Azriana Manalu, chairperson of the National Commission for Violence against Women (Komnas Perempuan), said on Thursday that the ministry under newly sworn-in Minister I Gusti Ayu Bintang Darmawati “could lead” urgent measures to ensure the legal marrying age for girls is increased from 16 to 19 in the planned revision of the 1974 Marriage Law. The law currently stipulates the minimum marrying age for boys is 19.
Just before the end of the House’s term in September, the government led by Bintang’s predecessor Yohana S. Yembise and legislators finally agreed that the marrying age for females and males should be at least 19. The 2002 Child Protection Law defines children as those aged 18 and under.
The lawmakers had been convinced following intense lobbying that also involved activists and the commission and a successful judicial review of the Marriage Law submitted by child marriage survivors at the Constitutional Court, which issued the ruling last December.
Latest figures from UNICEF show that Indonesia has the world’s eighth-highest absolute number of child marriages, at 1.46 million. President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo last year pledged to end child marriages amid mounting pressure.
“We need much more complete data on child marriages,” Azriana told The Jakarta Post. “We know nothing of unreported cases as available data is mostly compiled from local Islamic courts where parents can request the necessary dispensation to have their children married at an even younger age than that stipulated in the 1974 law.”
