Woman's case rallies legal system opponents

Jakarta: An Indonesian mother who was fined, jailed and put on trial after sending an e-mail to friends complaining about her treatment in a private hospital, has become a rallying point for reform of the country's legal system.

Indonesia's unpredictable legal system is one of the main deterrents to much needed investment.

While President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, who is seeking re-election next month, has pushed through some reforms and made inroads tackling graft, reform of the legal system has lagged.

The defamation case against Prita Mulyasari has sparked a public uproar over a perception that she has been miserably treated by a legal system that often favours the rich and well-connected in the world's fourth-most populous country.

"The application of the law has to be fair and transparent," Yudhoyono, who is currently favourite to win a new term, told a televised presidential debate.

A survey by Indonesia's anti-corruption agency in February found the judiciary was the most graft-prone public institution in the country.

The legal system is also notoriously complex. In addition to codes dating from the Dutch colonial era, Indonesia has passed a blizzard of new local laws to allow greater decentralisation.

Foreign companies have frequently become ensnared in controversial legal battles in Indonesia's courts. A local unit of Canada's Manulife Financial Corp was declared bankrupt by an Indonesian court in 2002, despite being solvent. The Supreme Court later overturned that ruling.

Earlier this year, the top court reversed a 1 trillion rupiah (Dh349 million) libel ruling against Time magazine over an article alleging that former dictator Suharto and his family had amassed a $15 billion fortune.

Mulyasari, 32, a middle-income mother raising two young children, was initially fined $30,000 in a civil case and then jailed for three weeks ahead of a criminal case under a controversial information law passed in 2008 that means she could face up to six years in jail for spreading false news online.