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Jakarta Post

Legal support lacking for victims of childhood sexual abuse

A recent court ruling on child sexual abuse in Jambi province has exposed the shortcomings of Indonesian court procedures in dealing with the human impact of violence against children

Jon Afrizal (The Jakarta Post)
Jambi
Wed, March 18, 2020

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Legal support lacking for victims of childhood sexual abuse

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span>A recent court ruling on child sexual abuse in Jambi province has exposed the shortcomings of Indonesian court procedures in dealing with the human impact of violence against children.

As the number of cases involving the sexual abuse of children has continued to rise in recent years, experts and activists have pointed to the fact that the rights of child victims and witnesses have not been comprehensively addressed in Indonesian laws and regulations.

The lack of standards for handling legal proceedings on sexual assault cases have raised concerns among critics, particularly as it relates to trauma and accusations of victimization.

On Jan. 29, a 45-year-old civil servant from Simpang Tiga Sipin district in Jambi was acquitted on all criminal charges by the state court of Jambi. He was accused of sexually assaulting six children aged 9 to 12.

The court decision came as a shock to the local community, particularly as Jambi public prosecutors sought a six-year jail term for the man, known as Ambok Lang, for allegedly violating Law No.23/2002 on child protection.

The case was brought to the public’s attention when Ambok, who was known as an Islamic tutor in his community, was reported to the authorities for allegedly luring children into performing sexual acts in exchange for money.

The case was sent to the state court of Jambi in 2019 after six alleged child victims told their parents about their encounters with Ambok.

Public prosecutors challenged the Jambi court ruling by filing an appeal with the Supreme Court after the justices delivered their verdict.

The parents of the accusers also submitted formal letters of complaint to the Attorney Commission, the National Commission for Child Protection (Komnas PA) and the Judicial Commission on Feb. 21.

But while the legal process against Ambok must still run its course, the parents are left to consider how best to address the lingering trauma that their children have had to endure.

Neneng, the mother of one of the children, said that her child had developed a fear of being left alone. Other times, she had to deal with frequent bouts of crying and daydreaming. It does not help that Ambok Lang still lives in the same neighborhood as the family.

Neneng said she and the other parents of the alleged victims had demanded trauma healing assistance from the authorities but said that their appeals had fallen on deaf ears.

The Women and Children Protection Ministry’s Jambi unit for technical management (UPTD) head, Asi Nopriani, promised that her team would provide the necessary psychological assistance for the victims and their families, adding that the organization was prevented from taking part in court proceedings.

“I have received the police’s investigation report, but I wasn’t invited to the court [to provide assistance to the children],” she said.

After some field work, Asi discovered that some of the court proceedings had resulted in the mistreatment of the alleged victims, resulting in psychological damage.

During legal proceedings, for instance, there was nothing to prevent them from enduring more trauma by having the accused appear on trial in the same room as them.

Asi also pointed out that the children were made to stand trial and face an onslaught of questions by prosecutors, defense attorneys and judges, without any consideration for their maturity or wellbeing.

“We can’t imagine how hard and scary it was for the children, especially when they are themselves already victims,” said Livia Iskandar, a psychologist and deputy chief of the Witness and Victims Protection Agency (LPSK), in a statement to The Jakarta Post.

Livia said that the ideal standard procedures for dealing with child victims and witnesses should be to make legal proceedings less formal and intimidating for children.

For instance, she suggested that the judges, attorneys and prosecutors should approach the cross-examination of children by engaging in role-play, and that the court should provide toys to lessen the probability of traumatic experiences for the children.

Children count among the most vulnerable group of individuals, according to a 2019 LPSK study, in which 350 out of the total of 1,983 legal cases demanding social or psychological assistance involved child victims of sexual abuse. The figure represents a sharp increase from the 271 cases reported in 2018.

“This is why we need the sexual violence bill to pass. So that victims of sexual assault — especially children — will be treated with more dignity, as the bill regulates all the legal procedures required,” Livia said.

Deliberations on the sexual violence bill have been set back by heated debate between progressive feminist and conservative groups, centered on the moral and human impacts of sexual issues in a largely socially conservative but increasingly free-speaking society.

A growing number of experts, however, point to the bill as one of the few ways to preserve the rights of underage victims of sexual assault.

Genoveva Alicia of the Institute of Criminal Justice Reform said that there was no mention of a standard mechanism for court proceedings involving child victims of sexual assault in the Criminal Law Procedures Code (KUHAP).

The KUHAP also fails to mention medical and psychological assistance for victims testifying before the court, the legal expert said. Nor does it set limitations on questioning victims or witnesses, particularly regarding sensitive or traumatic questions on sexual assault.

Ideally, Genoveva said, police and court justices would be expected to provide all the relevant information on medical and psychological assistance to the victims’ families. However, such provisions were rarely practiced in the real world.

In the end, the exposure of such cases on social media was one of the best ways to ensure that victims of sexual abuse got appropriate physiological and psychological assistance.

“In Indonesia, victims are expected to proactively look for physiological assistance on their own. But without relying on the legal apparatus to tell them, most victims don’t know any such assistance exists in the first place,” Genoveva told the Post.

“It is regrettable that without any big media exposure, oftentimes there won’t be any hands to reach out to them first.” (trn/tjs)

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