July 15, 2014 edition
ROWS of bottles and cans of alcohol fill a cooler in a shop near Sudirman railway station in South Jakarta. They come in different brands, and their prices vary, from 'only' Rp19,000 to Rp80,000. The liquor stand side by side with soft drinks. There is no notice indicating who may and who may not purchase the item.
Getting alcohol is also easy in remote parts of the country. "Indonesia is a paradise for strong drinks, available even to underage children," said Fahira Idris, chair of the Movement Against Liquor and the daughter of former Industry Minister Fahmi Idris. Since it was established last year, the movement has campaigned for greater restriction and control of distribution of alcoholic beverages. Liquor, Fahira said, has triggered acts of crime all over Indonesia.
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January 1, 1970 edition
THE five judges took turns reading out the verdict in the corruption case of disgraced Constitutional Court Chief Justice Akil Mochtar on Monday last week. It took them more than six hours to get through the entire document. Finally at around 10:30pm, the panel of judges presided over by Suwidya Abdullah announced its final decision: life behind bars for Akil. It was the harshest punishment ever handed out to a graft convict in Indonesia.
Akil was not surprised; in the courtroom he said he would appeal. After the trial, he told journalists he had expected the decision. "I'm filing an appeal even as high as the heavens," said Akil, who once declared that corruptors should have their fingers cut off.
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July 1, 2014 edition
The late evening discussion took place at the headquarters of Projo (short for "Pro-Jokowi") in Pancoran, South Jakarta, in early June. There were only four participants, and the discussion was held a day after the Joko Widodo-Jusuf Kalla and Prabowo Subianto-Hatta Rajasa presidential tickets received their serial numbers at the General Election Commission (KPU) office.
One of the participants, Sunggul Hamonangan Sirait, head of Projo's Law and Constitution Division, told Tempo that the four agreed that a judicial review of the presidential election rules be forwarded. "The existing law does not accommodate the instance of only two contestants running," Sunggul said last week.
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January 1, 1970 edition
THE sound of the siren broke the night's silence at the gate of the Jakarta International School (JIS) Kindergarten on Friday two weeks ago. Dozens of police officers stood guard on each corner of the intersection at Pondok Indah, South Jakarta. The sirens paused for a moment, then began to wail again. It went on like that for more than half an hour. "It sounded like there was a war coming," Abdul Hamid, who lives not far from the JIS complex, told Tempo last week.
Putri (the names of the victims and their family members in this article have been changedEd.), the mother of a young student at the center of a rape scandal at the school, joined a group of police that night. According to Putri, the officers sounded their sirens because they had been barred from entering the JIS complex. JIS security guards turned them away because they did not have any confirmation. Only after JIS lawyers Harry Pontoh and Hotman Paris Hutapea arrived on the scene, were the police allowed in.
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June 17, 2014 edition
THE SITE appears inconspicuous, if centrally located, on Jalan Sudirman in Central Jakarta, next to Bank Negara Indonesia's head office in the capital's downtown business district. Mostly empty, it serves as a parking lot by those who frequent the lone Arthaloka Building that stands on it.
Despite its benign appearance, the site has for years been the object of a heated struggle for its control. The conflict has already sent two people to prison, Ina Nasution, a lawyer from Sani, Aminoeddin & Partners law firm, told Tempo last week.
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January 1, 1970 edition
IN THE WAKE of the Constitutional Court's severe curtailing of the House of Representatives' (DPR) power to select its justices, a new suit has been brought before the court that seeks to further mitigate lawmakers' authority over law enforcement institutions. This time it is the DPR's jurisdiction over who sits on the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) and the Judicial Commission (KY) that is under scrutiny.
The plaintiffs are academics from the Indonesian Islamic University (UII) in Yogyakarta. Four court sessions have been held. "We're awaiting the court's decision," Sri Hastuti Puspitasari, one of the judicial review applicants, told Tempo on Wednesday last week.
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January 1, 1970 edition