JakartaPost-Oct 5
With a backlog of unresolved human rights violations and continuing violence in Papua, the nine new National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) members approved on Tuesday have their work cut out for them. They were confirmed in a House of Representatives plenary meeting after being interviewed and selected the day before by lawmakers on House Commission III overseeing legal affairs. Commission III had chosen the nominees out of a pool of 14 candidates previously vetted by an independent panel. Lawmakers named scholar and women’s rights defender Atnike Nova Sigiro the chair of Komnas HAM, making her the first woman to lead the commission. Migrant worker rights defender Anis Hidayah, legal aid lawyer Hari Kurniawan, agrarian researcher Saurlin P Siagian and Uli Parulian Sihombing, a director of an NGO focused on law, are among the new commissioners. Activists and observers are counting on the new commissioners to bring major breakthroughs in the monitoring and handling of rights abuse cases, especially with regard to incidents in Papua and past violations that remain unresolved. Ati Nurbaiti, cofounder of feminist organization Solidaritas Perempuan, said the new commissioners should seek to improve the body’s ability to handle human rights cases in Papua and ensure that the government upholds the right to information in the region and gives free access to journalists to report on Papua. “They should improve their lobbying with the government to ensure more access to information,” she said. Komnas HAM has declared 12 past atrocities in the country gross human rights violations but has only managed to bring one case – the 2014 Bloody Paniai incident – before a human rights tribunal. Read more at: https://www.thejakartapost.com/paper/2022/10/04/new-komnas-ham-commissioners-face-uphill-battle.html.
