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The Bali Bonk Ban that wasn’t – media gets it wrong. Again.

by Duncan Graham and Kim Wingerei | Dec 15, 2022 | Comment & Analysis, Latest Posts

Cancel your flights, lock your bedrooms. If you’re off to Bali and you’re not married, forget having sex, they’ll put you in gaol! So say Australian mainstream media and the Government’s travel advisory. Except they didn’t check the story, Duncan Graham and Kim Wingerei report from Indonesia.

Nothing quite like a bonk-ban to excite the headline writers at Fairfax, News Limited, The Guardian and the ABC. Even the Government’s own Smarttravellers website got in on the act. Failing to check their facts, all in the interest of a saucy story or updated advice to sex-hungry travellers.

The G20 in Bali last month was a splendid success – and not just because world leaders talked to each other proving differences can sometimes be understood, if not always accepted.

The grand two-day event also showcased Indonesia as a modern, progressive, tolerant and efficient state deserving respect and applause. No longer. Cheers have turned to jeers.

Now the international news isn’t about grand-scale diplomatic breakthroughs that could make the world a safer place. That worthy account has been kicked to touch by lawmakers climbing into bedrooms.

There’s hardly a newspaper, radio or TV station around the world which hasn’t run the story of the Indonesian Legislative Assembly unanimously revising the Criminal Code to modify a clause making consensual extramarital sex illegal.

Inevitably it’s been tagged the “Bali bonk-ban” – and the mockery is as widespread as it is poorly informed. And the salacious reports divert from the more serious questions: How did this come about, when will it happen, who’s running this show and what’s the intent?

Family Love Alliance

The story starts more than six years ago when the Aliansi Cinta Keluarga (Family Love Alliance) started to get its agenda heard.

Until then, radical Muslims had backed the Front Pembela Islam (FPI – Islamic Defenders’ Front). It used firebrand speakers and mass rallies to force demands for an end to pluralism, liberalism and other perceived Western pollutants.

Their biggest success came in late 2016 when it overfilled Jakarta’s one-square-kilometre Merdeka (Freedom) park and engineered blasphemy charges against the city governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama. Better known as Ahok, the ethnic Chinese Christian was jailed for two years.

The government took fright at the growing power of the FPI so jailed its leader Rizieq Shihab, and got tough on his followers. On one occasion police shot six dead on a Jakarta highway – driving the radicals underground.

Since then the Family Love Alliance has filled the vacuum by claiming it wants to strengthen “family values.”

The Alliance appears mild and mainstream, the image a gathering of grannies. The giveaway is the acronym it uses – AILA – Arabic for “big family.” As one commentator noted, there is a concern that:

…the AILA is exploiting the existing legal system to turn law enforcers into a morality police, so that later they will practically do what the FPI has been doing for years.

But before readers cancel their Kuta getaways, note that the law has to be ratified and signed off by President Joko ‘Jokowi’ Widodo. Judicial appeals are likely. and even as it stands, the law won’t go into effect for another three years.

Despite that, the big end of town is also expressing concerns. The US Ambassador in Jakarta, Sung Kim, has reportedly forecast “a negative impact on the investment climate.” And there are reports that tourism businesses “horrified” by the overseas headlines will allegedly be lobbying to get unwed foreigners excluded from the no-cohabitation rule.

But the Government has been quick to placate those most vocal and to clarify what is actually being proposed. In a press release headed “Clarification of misleading news of imprisonment on adultery article of the new criminal code”, a spokesman states:

…only husband or wife (for those who are married) or parents or children (for those who are not married) can make complaints.

It goes on to say that “other parties cannot report it, or even ‘playing judge’ So there will be no legal process without complaints from the rightful party, who is directly harmed.”

In other words, even when this gets into effect in three years – and that remains a big if – tourists are highly unlikely to be effected. Hotels are neither compelled to, nor would they have any interest in, dobbing in guests or checking their marriage certificates.

Equally lost in most of the media commentary is that this law is an amendment to a law – The Criminal Code – that dates back to Dutch colonial days. There has always been a “bonk-ban” in place, rarely invoked, the difference is that it now limits who can report it.

According to the Indonesian Government “there are no substantive changes related to this article when compared to Article 284 of the old Criminal Code. The difference lies only in the addition of parties who have the right to complain and even if proven true, there are alternative sanctions of no more than 10 million Rupiah ($A1,000).”

The Government’s clarifying press release further says that “The new Criminal Code has also never provided additional administrative requirements for business actors in the tourism sector to ask anyone about their marital status.”

So there’s really nothing to worry about. If all this time tourists and investors can be comfortable in Indonesia, then this condition will not change either.

Deputy Minister of Law and Human Rights Edward Hiariej has also been quoted as saying nothing will change until the new regulations are assembled.

Revisions to the Criminal Code

There are other revisions to the Criminal Code that are much more concerning in a country which wags call a “pious democracy” as all citizens must belong to one of the five approved religions.

In a move towards Thailand’s lese majesty laws, Indonesia’s legislators also want insulting the president and ministers to be a jailable offence.

It’s unclear whether normally humble Widodo supports this oppression of speech. Most likely it’s been inserted by politicians jealous of their status as the definition is a catch-all:

An act that humiliates or damages the honour, or the image of the government or state institutions, including insulting or slandering.

Although the adultery clause is getting the most attention, this is just one of 600 changes to the Criminal Code, with many replacing a mish-mash of old Dutch law, customary law and laws passed since the country was declared a republic in 1945.

At the time there was a strong push to make the new nation a theocracy and compel Muslims to follow Shariah law.

That failed, but the zealots haven’t given up. These new laws don’t go that far, but they may weaken the secular state, and they may ease the way for harsher changes in the future.

But in the meantime, go to Bali and enjoy the beaches, the surf, the cheap food, the ceremonies and the friendly people. And have sex.

Digital nomads preferred: Australian retirees in Bali being told to pay up or move out

An earlier version of this article first appeared on Pearls & Irritations – link here.

Duncan Graham has a Walkley Award, two Human Rights Commission awards and other prizes for his radio, TV and print journalism in Australia. He now lives in Indonesia.

Kim Wingerei is a businessman turned writer and commentator. He is passionate about free speech, human rights, democracy and the politics of change. Originally from Norway, Kim has lived in Australia for 30 years. Author of ‘Why Democracy is Broken – A Blueprint for Change’.

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