•    HOME   
•    NEWS   
•    BUSINESS   
•    INTERNATIONAL   
•    TECH   
•    SPORTS   
•    LIFE & TIMES   
•    OPINION   
•    MY JAKARTA   
•    BLOGS   
•    EYEWITNESS   

Legislators deliberating a bill to regulate mass organizations said over the weekend that foreign nongovernmental organizations would also be subject to the new legislation.

Abdul Malik Haramain, the chairman of the House of Representatives’ special subcommittee on the bill, said on Saturday that there were around 150 foreign NGOs operating in the country despite never formally registering with the government.

“That’s why the amendments that we’re drawing up for the 1985 Law on Mass Organizations must get these groups in line,” he said.

He added it was important to prevent “the leak of information out of the country,” but said the mechanism to regulate the groups was still being discussed.

Tri Pranadji, an adviser to the home affairs minister and a consulting expert on the bill, said plans to regulate foreign organizations in the country had long been in the pipeline but had been put off time after time.

“We’ve always wanted to do this, but we were concerned about coming off as repressive,” he said.

The bill was initially aimed at limiting the activities of hard-line Islamic organizations, many of which employ violent and often criminal tactics.

However, the change in focus to foreign NGOs has revived a controversial campaign by the House and hard-liners to crack down on the foreign groups.

Greenpeace in particular has come under much scrutiny. It was ordered to vacate its office in Kemang, South Jakarta, because the area was designated as a residential zone. However, several other office and commercial buildings in the same area have been allowed to operate as usual.

In October, John Sauven, the Greenpeace UK director, was turned back at Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta International Airport by immigration officials despite having a valid visa.

The government said his presence posed a threat of “instability and disorder” to the country but did not elaborate.

Days later, Andy Tait, a Greenpeace forest campaigner, was deported. Supporters of the organization speculated that the NGO was targeted because of its campaigns against palm oil companies accused of destroying the environment.

The call to scrutinize foreign groups came in April when House Speaker Marzuki Alie questioned the presence in the legislature’s offices of the United Nations Development Program, which he erroneously labeled an NGO.

The controversial Intelligence Law, passed last year, also puts foreign NGOs in the spotlight by giving the State Intelligence Agency (BIN) power to oversee foreigners and foreign institutions planning to visit, work, study or open an office in the country.

Activists are currently mounting a judicial review to have the law repealed.