Damian Agata Yuvens speaks to reporters outside the Constitutional Court in Jakarta on Thursday (Photo by Ryan Dagur)
Indonesia's Constitutional Court on Thursday rejected a petition for a judicial review of the country’s 1974 marriage law, which critics say effectively forbids interfaith unions.
In August last year, five university students challenged the constitutionality of the law’s provision stating that “marriage is legitimate if done according to the law of each religion and belief” — wording the students’ petition argued was too vague and led to forced conversions.
“The court sees that the plaintiff’s request is legally baseless and, therefore, rejects it,” lead judge Arief Hidayat said in his reading of the verdict.
“The article saying that marriage is legitimate if done according to the law of each religion and belief isn’t a violation of the constitution,” Hidayat said.
Damian Agata Yuvens, one of the five plaintiffs, said he respected the court’s decision but had not given up hope for challenging the law.
“We’ll evaluate this verdict before taking the next step. The next legal move will really depend on our discussions,” Yuvens told ucanews.com after the verdict was announced.
Albertus Patty, co-chairman of the Communion of Churches in Indonesia, said he regretted the court’s decision.
“Why should the state put a limit on someone’s right? The state’s role is to make sure that there’s no conflict.”
Mohammad Machasin, a member of the Directorate General of Guidance for Muslim Affairs at the Religious Affairs Ministry, supported the court’s verdict but acknowledged that the issue of interfaith marriage remains a contentious one.
“There’s a need to choose [one religion]. There’s a possible pressure,” he told ucanews.com
Amidhan Saberah, chairman of the Indonesian Ulema Council, also welcomed the court’s decision as a triumph of religion over human rights.
“What the plaintiffs requested was based on a human rights issue. But it can’t be used as a basis for justifying interfaith marriage,” he told ucanews.com.
“We think that a religion is very basic. It is more than human rights.”
In its verdict on Thursday, the court also struck down a challenge by the five plaintiffs to amend the age of marriage outlined in the 1974 law — a challenge endorsed by the Women's Health Foundation and the Child Rights Monitoring Foundation.
The plaintiffs had argued that the current age of 16 unfairly inhibited young women's access to education and raised the threat of increased maternal mortality, according to a report by the Jakarta Globe.
However, the court said that raising the marriage age to 18 would not necessarily decrease the risks to women's health, the report said.