Indonesia Regulation Problematic,Especially for Drug Users:Expert

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - In a series of events that was held by the Coalition for the Abolition of Death Penalty in Asean (CAPDA) on Friday, September 9, 2016, one of the panel discussions talks about the legal policy on drug traffickers and the irony on drug users.

"There are problems in Indonesian's regulation. Especially for drug users," said Supriyadi W. Eddyono, an executive director of the Institute for Criminal Justice Reform (ICJR)/lawyer at the open forum discussion in Plaza Indonesia, Jakarta.

Supriyadi stated that according to a study, more than 90% of drug users are sent to jail. "Those people should be sent to rehabilitation and not jail," he said. Supriyadi continued that Indonesia has misconception towards narcotics and stigmatized those who are related to drugs. He reminded that it is important to define who are the victims and who are the perpetrators. Supriyadi added that the Indonesian law is being proven to target users than the sellers. He commented on how confusing the Indonesian law is. Supriyadi ended the discussion by asking the audience "is death penalty really the way?"

Professor Irwanto from the Psychology faculty of Atmajaya, who also attended the discussion, stated that "Fear does not stop people from doing crime, it has not been proven that death penalty resulted in reduction in the number of crimes." He added that it is merely a reverse logic where we are trying to protect justice by violating human rights. "Human is not formed within one day. It takes them all life to be fully formed. Monsters are created by everyone. By the broken system, by the society," Irwanto explained.

According to Irwanto, Indonesian law is a chaos, especially in regulating drugs and its users and traffickers. "Its not about drugs, people die from the poor system," he said.

AUDREY JULIA | TEMPO