"The most alarming thing is that the trend of the country moving in the wrong direction is not just happening in practices on the ground, as it also extends to the diminishing space human rights occupies in the vision of the government and the head of state, and in planned government policies," Foundation of the Indonesian Legal Aid Institute (YLBHI) advocacy division head M. Isnur said at the release of the foundation's 2019 annual report in Central Jakarta on Wednesday.

The Human Rights Watch’s recently released World Report 2020 did not paint a much rosier picture.

“Indonesia had been the good news story in Southeast Asia, but in the past year the human rights situation took a turn for the worse,” Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said in a release on the organization's website. “Problematic new laws nearly passed, abusive old ones continue to be enforced and minorities didn’t get the legal protection they need.”

Isnur cited the government's proposed omnibus law on job creation as an example of the political elites' attempt to "erase protections for people's rights".

"For example, in the case of employment, workers are protected by the guarantee of work security. If [the law] makes it easier for [companies] to fire people, than that protection is gone," he said.

YLBHI chairwoman Asfinawati detailed five findings from the organization's annual report that indicated the deteriorating state of human rights in the country last year and why it seemed unlikely to improve in the new year.

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