JHP Journal Editor’s Note
Cecep Mustafa
The story of Indonesia’s Judicial Commission (Komisi Yudisial, or KY) is, in many ways, a parable about the hopes and hazards of reform. Born from the turbulence of the post-1998 Reformasi era, it carried the weight of national disappointment on its shoulders—a disappointment in justice itself. At that time, trust in the judiciary was scraping the bottom of history’s barrel. A 2001 Kompas poll told a brutal truth: nearly three-quarters of Indonesians believed no legal institution in the country was fair. When faith in justice dies, societies don’t just become cynical—they become unstable. The KY was meant to be a cure for that collective disillusionment, a bright child of reform meant to remind judges that the robe they wear is not a shield against accountability.
But as the years have shown, good intentions do not always produce good institutions. The KY’s inclusion in the 1945 Constitution—intended as a gesture of strength and independence—has proven to be one of those well-meaning decisions that created more problems than it solved. In fact, it stands as a constitutional misstep, a kind of category error. A body that was never meant to be a principal organ of the state was granted a constitutional pedestal. What was envisioned as a mechanism for ethical oversight became, in constitutional terms, an awkward guest at the high table of state power.
Let’s rewind for a moment. The post-Reformasi framers were desperate to rebuild public confidence in the rule of law. The courts were seen as corrupt, unaccountable, and opaque. The old internal oversight mechanism—the MPPH, a kind of “judges judging judges” committee from 1968—had long since dissolved into irrelevance, crippled by the spirit of esprit de corps that often turns oversight into mere self-defense. So when the constitutional amendments came, the People’s Consultative Assembly (MPR) decided that judicial integrity needed a new guardian, one with teeth and, importantly, one that stood outside the judiciary itself. Their solution was bold: carve the Judicial Commission directly into the Constitution.
Yet, as boldness often does, it came with a blind spot. By elevating an auxiliary body to constitutional status, the framers blurred a crucial distinction. As constitutional scholar J.G. Steenbeek once emphasized, a constitution is meant to house only fundamental organs of state—the big players, not their assistants. The KY was designed as a supporting actor in the drama of judicial power, not one of its protagonists. Its function was to ensure that the main characters—the judges—stayed true to the script of justice. But by writing it into the Constitution, the framers effectively made the stagehand a lead actor.
Worse, they did so under the banner of “checks and balances.” It’s a beautiful phrase, one that politicians love to utter and academics love to dissect. But here, the principle was stretched beyond recognition. The checks and balances doctrine applies to the great triad of power—executive, legislative, and judicial—not to the internal moral hygiene of one branch. The Constitutional Court, in its 2006 ruling, politely but firmly called out this misunderstanding, labeling it an “erroneous interpretation.” The KY, the Court clarified, was never meant to be a counterweight to the judiciary as an institution, but a moral custodian of its members. Ethics, not power, was its realm. It was not a check, but a mirror.
This misinterpretation planted the seeds of decades of turbulence. The Judicial Commission’s authority has since ebbed and flowed like the tides—expanded by legislative enthusiasm, then clipped by judicial defensiveness. At one point, through various statutes, it wielded nine distinct powers, from recommending Supreme Court justices to enforcing codes of conduct. But each expansion was met by the sharp scalpel of judicial review. The 2006 Constitutional Court decision stripped the KY of its power to oversee Supreme Court justices. Later, in 2014, another ruling went even further, striking down an entire law that had dared to give it new functions. One might say that the KY’s story is a cycle of constitutional optimism followed by judicial correction—like Sisyphus pushing his rock up the hill of reform, only to watch it roll back down with every court decision.
Despite the setbacks, the KY remains a symbol of a noble idea: that judges, like all humans, must be accountable. Yet its relationship with the Supreme Court has been a textbook case of institutional tension—somewhere between sibling rivalry and cold war. In its early years, the KY took an almost prosecutorial approach, operating under the assumption that judicial misconduct was not the exception but the rule. The justices, predictably, did not appreciate this enthusiasm. The result was a judicial rebellion of sorts, with thirty-one Supreme Court justices petitioning the Constitutional Court to clip the Commission’s wings—and they succeeded.
Still, cooperation was not impossible. In 2009, both institutions achieved something remarkable: they jointly crafted the Code of Ethics and Code of Conduct for Judges, a moral compass to guide the judiciary. It was a moment of institutional maturity—a rare alignment between oversight and self-regulation. But harmony, as always, was temporary. The two bodies soon clashed again over where “technical judicial matters” end and “ethical violations” begin. When a judge misstates a filing deadline, is that incompetence or immorality? To a lawyer, it might be a procedural hiccup; to the KY, it could be a moral failure. Such gray zones keep the Commission in a perpetual tug-of-war with the judiciary, trapped between principle and practicality.
This brings us to the heart of the constitutional dilemma. By placing the KY within the 1945 Constitution, Indonesia created an internal contradiction. Article 24B establishes the Commission’s existence, yet Article 24(3) clearly states that other bodies related to judicial power “shall be regulated by law.” In other words, the Constitution both includes and excludes the KY at the same time—a kind of legal double exposure. The result is a tension that no amount of statutory tweaking can resolve.
So what should be done? Perhaps it’s time for Indonesia to be as bold in correction as it once was in creation. The most logical step forward would be a fifth amendment to the 1945 Constitution—one that removes the KY from the constitutional text and re-establishes it by statute. This would not weaken the institution but restore coherence to the constitutional architecture. After all, strength does not come from being mentioned in the Constitution; it comes from clarity of function and consistency of law. The Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), after all, has wielded immense power without such enshrinement.
Until such reform comes, however, the KY must learn to thrive within its current limits. Its six remaining powers—proposing Supreme Court justices, upholding judicial ethics, co-drafting and enforcing the Code of Conduct, selecting judges, and forming the Honorary Council of Judges—are still meaningful. Perhaps the lesson of its history is that more authority does not always mean more effectiveness. By focusing on the quality, not the quantity, of its powers, the KY can strengthen its credibility and prove that reform is not about expansion, but integrity.
In the end, the Judicial Commission stands as a mirror to Indonesia’s constitutional journey: idealistic, ambitious, occasionally confused, but always striving for justice. Its story reminds us that democracy is not built in one amendment or one institution—it is a living process of learning from our own contradictions. Maybe, just maybe, the KY’s greatest contribution will not be the powers it holds, but the questions it forces us to ask about power itself.
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