PALMOILMAGAZINE, JAKARTA – Achmad Surambo, the Director of Sawit Watch, filed a lawsuit with the Constitutional Court on Wednesday, September 20, 2023, with the aim of drawing attention to the accountability of palm oil companies for years of violations.
In an official statement provided to Palmoilmagazine.com, Surambo highlighted that the prospect of penalizing palm oil plantation companies operating in forested areas had created legal uncertainties. This situation has the potential to exacerbate the already challenging issue of smallholder plantations in forested regions.
Substituting the legal process with administrative fines could prove detrimental to smallholders. Furthermore, Sawit Watch called on the government to prioritize addressing the concerns of villages located within forested areas.”
Also Read: Sawit Watch Exposes the Issue: 3.3 Million Hectares of Palm Oil
Meanwhile Senior Advisor of Indonesia Human Right Committee For Social Justice (IHCS), Gunawan said that legal uncertainty is clearly shown up through the different regulation in the Laws Number 6 / 2023 about the Decision of Government Regulation in Lieu of Law Number 2 / 2022 about Undang-Undang Cipta Kerja (UUCK) to be Laws, and the implementation regulation (Government Regulation (GR) Number 24 / 2021. One significant difference is in the legal subject.
UUCK and GR Number 24 / 2021 regulate that every one that does operating business and get permit in forest region is legal subject. But GR Number 24 / 2021 regulates that legal subject is every one that does palm oil plantation business that operates in forest regions and gets permits of location, business in plantations. This raises legal uncertainty because the implementation regulation regulates legal subject that has no permit in forestry business.
Gunawan focused on the difference of time period. GR Number 24 / 2021 also regulates that palm oil plantations in forest regioins should solve every business permit terms and conditions in forest regions in three years. But the substitution in Laws Number 6 / 2023 regulates that the time period to solve terms and condition in business permit in forest regions should be not after 2 November 2023.
The legal uncertainty that relates to palm oil plantations in forest regions is a serious issue to solve. The sue reflects everything to clarify and solve the issue fairly and firmly. This also reminds us that it is important to harmonize regulation and the implementation to get legal certainty in palm oil sectors in Indonesia.
“Legal uncertainty raises when legal subject regulated in the level of Laws is those that got forestry business permit while the implementation regulation regulates the legal subject that has not forestry business permit,” he said.
Back to Surambo, he added that the sue was proposed to Constitutional Court as the way to confirm that palm oil companies should not ignore their responsibility that they have done for many years. (T2)
