Makassar MSF_Kak Ema & and jaringan ndentitas Hukum di SULSEL
Mobile and integrated legal identity service delivery under the spotlight
How to provide legal identity documents to citizens through integrated and mobile services was the hotly debated topic at a multistakeholder forum in Makassar on 6-7 May 2015.
Australia Indonesia Partnership for Justice (AIPJ), the Child Protection Centre at the University of Indonesia (PUSKAPA UI) and PEKKA met with government and civil society organisations (CSOs) to reflect on service delivery achievements, and to explore how CSOs and government can better collaborate, especially at the village level.
There was an acknowledgment at the forum that integrated and mobile services significantly improves delivery to groups that face many barriers to access. Women who are poor, people with disabilities, and people living in remote areas would particularly benefit from such an initiative. As an example, the courts, Office of Religious Affairs and civil registry all provide legal identity services at the village level on the same day and issue marriage legalisation decisions, marriage and birth certificates. For people living in the villages this means reduced transportation costs, multiple trips to different agencies, and overall raises the awareness of legal identity issues and services.
Other key achievements mentioned in the forum included:
• The significant increase in itsbat nikah cases heard by the Watampone Religious Court from 91 cases (2012) to 920 cases (2014). A ten-fold increase over the two year period.
• The tripling of birth certificates issued by the Bone civil registry from 14,061 birth certificates (2012) to 43,421 (2014).
CSOs also presented examples of excellent collaboration with government agencies to facilitate legal identity documents for individuals. PEKKA mentioned the strong support they received from the Religious Court in Watampone, as well as the civil registry and Office of Religious Affairs in Bone. The Institute of Community Justice Makassar spoke about two integrated and mobile services that were organised to provide Muslim and non-Muslim citizens with legal identity documents. The services were coordinated with the Social Affairs Department in the City of Makassar and received financial support from the district government budget.
Plans were also shared on upcoming programs. The Madrassah Development Centre in South Sulawesi outlined how they will support the delivery of legal identity documents to children and their parents in up to 60 schools in the districts where AIPJ focuses (Bone, Bulukumba, Jeneponto and Sengkang). Disabled persons organisations reminded the forum of the need for people with disabilities to be able to receive information and participate at the integrated and mobile services planned for 2015.
The forum concluded with a call for adequate budget allocations from national (APBN) and district level (APBD) budgets. Currently, the Supreme Court has a budget allocated to waive court fees for individuals facing financial hardship. However, this is not adequately utilised. In the 2015 Watampone Religious Court budget only 80 court cases had their fees waivered compared with the 920 marriage legalisation cases heard in 2014.
