The Civil Society Coalition for Security Sector Reformhas criticized the deliberation on the Amendment to Law No. 34/2004 on the Indonesian Military (RUU TNI) at Fairmont Hotel Jakarta on March 14-15, 2025 as it was carried out secretly amidst public scrutiny on the substance of the revised TNI Law which is considered problematic. 

The coalition, which consists of various organizations such as Imparsial, YLBHI, KontraS, Amnesty International Indonesia, and LBH Jakarta, strongly criticized the House of Representatives (DPR) and government's measure in discussing this bill in a hurry and without public involvement.

They considered revision of the TNI Law as having the potential to threaten democracy, human rights enforcement, and weaken the military professionalism. 

One of the controversial points in the revision of the TNI Law is the expansion of the authority of active TNI personnel to occupy civilian positions. This policy is considered inconsistent with the principle of TNI professionalism and risks returning the TNI’s Dual Function, which gives the military a dominant role in civil government. 

"Expanding the placement of active TNI in civilian positions will reduce the role of civilians in government, strengthen the military's dominance in the realm of public policy, and risk creating dual loyalty," Andrie Yunus from Kontras spoke to Indonesia Business Post, on Monday, March 17, 2025.

Besides its substance, discussion of the TNI Bill in a luxury hotel is also considered as a form of budget waste amidst the government's policy of imposing massive efficiency. 

This criticism gains the momentum as the government previously reduced the budget in the education and health sectors, and postponed the inauguration of Civil Servant on the grounds of saving State spending. 

"The rhetoric of budget cuts has turned out to be just nonsense. At a time when the people are facing economic difficulties and the budget for important sectors is being reduced, the DPR and the government are holding discussions on the bill in a luxury hotel which clearly spends a large budget," Andrie said. 

The coalition also criticized the lack of transparency in the discussion process. The fact that the meeting was held on weekend and at the end of the DPR's recess period further strengthened the suspicion that the revision of the TNI Law was intended to be passed without public supervision. 

Previously, Deputy Chairman of Law, Human Rights, and Security Commission III of the House of Representatives, Adies Kadir, said that the TNI Bill would not be passed before the 2025 Idul Fitri recess and could only be discussed in the next session.

However, the discussion was accelerated behind closed doors at a luxury hotel over the weekend, raising questions about the commitment to transparency and public participation in the legislative process. 

Public rejection of the TNI Law revision grew stronger after the DPR was considered to have carried out a closed and rushed discussion process. This was confirmed in the DPR Leadership press conference on Monday, March 17, 2025, the first time they had shared the official draft of the TNI Bill with the media. 

Secret deliberation has raised public suspicion, especially because the draft bill was not available on the DPR website, making it difficult for the public to access. 

"Keeping the draft bill for themselves, then letting the public get a draft that may not be appropriate, is still wrong for the DPR. The principle of openness in discussing the bill should start from the availability of a draft that allows public participation," Lucius Karus from the Indonesian Parliament Watch (Formmappi) told Indonesia Business Post, on Tuesday, March 18, 2025. 

According to Lucius, in addition to minimumtransparency, the TNI Bill deliberation was also said to be rushed, without following the standard legislationprocedures. 

"The TNI Bill was suddenly included in the 2025 Priority Prolegnas List, along with the SOEs Bill which has been passed in a rapid process," he added. 

As a priority bill, its discussion should have gone through standard stages from Preparation of Academic Paper, Preparation of Bill Draft, Harmonization in the Legislative Body (Baleg), Request for Presidential Approval Letter to Discussion in the House. However, this procedure was allegedly ignored in order to speed up the ratification of the TNI Bill. 

The public is concerned that this fast and closed discussion will lead to the ratification of problematic regulations, as happened in the Job Creation Bill.

"Moreover, the revision of the TNI Law contains controversial articles that have the potential to threaten democracy and military professionalism," Lucius concluded.