INDONESIA PUSHES FOR LEGAL MUSCLE OVER MARRIAGES

By Ahmad Fuad Yahya

JAKARTA, Feb 18 (Bernama) -– The Indonesian government is formulating
legislation to make unregistered and contract or temporary marriages offences
which are punishable with a jail sentence or a fine.

Under the proposed law, a party to an unregistered marriage can be sentenced
to a six-month jail term or fined six million Rupiah (about RM2,000) and someone
guilty of a contract marriage can be sentenced to a three-month jail term or
fined three million Rupiah (about RM1,000), said Prof Dr H Nasaruddin Umar,
director-general of Muslim Community Development of the Ministry of Religious
Affairs, Wednesday.

In Indonesia, unregistered and contract marriages are those not conducted
before a government registrar of marriages.

Dr Nasaruddin said the unregistered marriage was valid in Islam so long as
it fulfilled the six pillars of marriage but added that this was more of a bane
than a boon and the government was tightening the rules.

He said the government wanted to remind Muslims that marriage was a noble
and sacred affair and should not be toyed with.


"Marriage is not only a human social contract but also a contract with God,"
he said.

In Indonesia, a child born out of an unregistered marriage is not entitled
to a birth certificate, identity card and passport, inheritances and the right
of consent of the biological father.

"The child becomes the offspring of the mother, not of the father. Is this
humane or not?" he said.

Dr Nasaruddin said divorces in Indonesia had risen 10 fold in recent years
to 200,000 cases for the whole of last year, and 75 per cent of these involved
divorces sought by wives, largely due to unfaithful husbands.

The proposed legislation became a controversy when the national women's
commission supported it because it would protect women's rights but drew
opposition from the Indonesian Council of Ulama (Religious Scholars) which felt
that marriage is a personal matter which should not be managed by the
government.

-- BERNAMA