Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Judicial Review on the Pornography Law

Legal action in Court must be prepared very carefully if we want to win the hearts of the Judges. For which purpose, any one who wants to take such action are advised to appoint a lawyer to represented to them if they want to succeed.

However, appointment of a lawyer does not always guarantee the success of a legal action. That’s exactly what happened to the Petition for Judicial Review of the Pornography Law filed with the Constitutional Court by famous lawyer O.C Kaligis on behalf of 11 North Sulawesi individuals who claimed to be the representatives Non Government Organizations (NGO) in North Sulawesi.
According to The Jakarta Post/E.Maulia, during the first court hearing yesterday, the council of judges demanded the Petitioners to prove their status as representatives of the NGOs. Besides, they were asked to mention correctly the Articles of the said Law that they want to be reviewed; and asked them to elaborate what harm that the Law might cause to the North Sulawesi community. The judges gave the Petitioners 14 days to revise their request.
Earlier, The Jakarta Globe/C. Pasandaran reported that 11 individuals who claimed to be the representatives of several Christian, student & minority organizations in North Sulawesi have requested the Judicial Review on three Articles of the Pornography Law i.e. Art. 1. about the Definition of Pornography, Art. 4. about the Production and Distribution of Pornographic materials, Art. 10. about the ban on Public Performances deemed to be Pornography.

The above shows that anyone who wants to fight in court should be very careful in preparing their actions although they are represented by well known lawyer.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Rightly said. Sadly, some lawyers nowadays do take things for granted, banking on technical issues to win their cases. No visit to crime scene nor taking statements from witnesses. Judical precedents/case law can help them as much as the law permits it. However, fact findings and advance research are sometime necessary to win cases. It's no easy job, which probably the reason why I decided not to practice law till now. :)

Unknown said...

Hi Ismail, you are very right. Especially when a lawyer is working on Pro Bono cases.
Thanks a lot for your comments.