JAKARTA, Indonesia Today ??? Legal attempt from Indonesian Human Rights Committee for Social Justice (IHCS) to terminate PT Freeport Indonesia’s contract of work hit a wall as district court declared that the NGO does not have legal standing to file the lawsuit.
Suko Harsono, presiding judge, stated that the judges??? considerations were that IHCS did not involve in the drafting process and did not suffer any loss caused by the work contract. The judges of South Jakarta District Court, therefore, turned down the lawsuit on Thursday, (Sep 13).
Responding to the decision, Gunawan, lawyer of IHCS, revealed that the verdict shows the judges’ inconsistency since the legal standing was undisputed in the interlocutory decision. IHCS is likely to file an appeal to the Jakarta High Court.
On the other side, Freeport Indonesia???s spokesperson Ramdani Sirait claimed that his company always obeys the regulation and maintains good communication with the government to discuss renegotiation of its contract of work.
The case started after IHCS filed a lawsuit to South JAKARTA District Court on July 2011 as they assessed that Freeport did not pay royalty as regulated. According to the contract of work signed in 1991, Freeport is obliged to pay 1% gold royalty to the Indonesian government.
Gunawan from IHCS, however, said that the amount was incompatible to the existing regulation, particularly Government Regulation No 45/2003, which regulates royalty of 3.75% from gold price multiplied by quantity.