Opinion

THE JUSTICE THEOLOGY FOR THE VIOLENCE-VICTIMIZED WOMEN

Abd A'la

The law enforcement in Indonesia, especially for the violence-victimized women, has not been able to grant the true sense of justice. Slowness, even neglected of settlement of violence and mass rape in May 1998 is a concrete example of legal barrenness to bring justice into the community life.
The phenomenon has occurred since so far the enforcement of justice seemed to run strongly in the form of procedural justice emphasizing only on regularity and implementation of formal legal. In line with that, the substantive justice as source of procedural justice are still in partial concept not reach completely the ideas and the reality that should be intrinsic part of the justice enforcement.
In such conditions, the development and application of justice are less able to complete the problems faced by people or groups, which experienced injustice. Even it often happens, on behalf of the justice, those people or the group was more distant from the actual reach of justice. Voices of the victims as the subject who need very much the justice nearly ignored at all. This reality makes the enforcement of justice have ambivalent face peeled off from the essential values of justice, and sometimes it thrust justice itself.
Theology of Justice
To eliminate the weaknesses, it requires reconstruction of justice lied on the basics of ethical-morale principal. The moral ethics to develop is transformative morality based on the universal and perennial values from which the people have to contextualize into real human beings experience.
In Indonesian context, where religion plays an important role in the formation of people attitudes and behavior, its substantive values and teachings should be constructed as one of main basis of such justice. The Indonesian people need to lay the theological values of justice as framework for the oppression and victimization, which the people experienced. This theological justice should be in strong relationship with the other noble religious values, such as truth, sincerity, and honesty so they could achieve a holistic comprehension of the justice from various sides.
By the formulation of the justice from perspective of the victims, the victims who actually need justice would become the focus of all enforcement process. At the same time, it could touch the sense of justice and support totally the violence-victimized women.
This justice theology endows all of the nation elements with strong responsibility to completion of May-1998 mass rape and the other violence cases, holistically. For achievement of it, they –in part –will encourage the State –e. i. the Government –continuously to open the true truth, which still closed so tightly so far.
From time to time, they would urge the government to listen to the voices of those violence-victimized women who most of them currently are in the silence. They will “force” the government to be patient to get all of the voices, without prejudice, preconception, and so forth. Hence, the government would see the truth as the truth in spite of the government and the other institutions (few or many) soiled with stains.
Through anchoring the justice theology from the victim perspective, and the government's firm attitude toward justice enforcement, the victims will be able to enjoy a sense of actual justice.
Then, in the name of justice, all of the nation components altogether should build a better Indonesia now and the future©.