REPORTER: Bronwyn Adcock:
Like many capital cities around the world, Jakarta has its red light district. After midnight, sex workers ply their trade and pornography is easy to find.
MAN: You like blue 'Indonesia'.
REPORTER: Yeah. What have you got?
MAN: 'Indonesia 1', 'Indonesia 3'. Indonesian porn?
Right now, pornography and sex are the subject of intense public debate in Indonesia, as one of the most controversial pieces of legislation ever seen here is considered by parliament. Known as the anti-pornography bill it has considerable political support, including from the Islamist Prosperous Justice Party. Hillman Roysad.
HILLMAN ROYSAD, ISLAMIST PROSPEROUS JUSTICE PARTY, (Translation): We know that pornography is dangerous, very dangerous. For individuals , the public, for children, for teenagers and so on. That's one thing. And the second thing is the fact that porn in Indonesia is too freely available
The bill regulates the distribution of pornography and much more, potentially changing the lives of all Indonesian women.
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI, UNITY AND DIVERSITY ALLIANCE: Well, the main problem is that it not only regulate the pornography, it regulate the way we behave, it regulate the way we dress, it regulate the way we conduct things.
Activist Yenny Rosa Damayanti is part of a broad coalition opposing the bill because of its attempts to regulate public morality, such as banning kissing in public and revealing clothes. .
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI: It say that it's considered as a criminal offence if you wear something that show your navel, your thigh, part of your breast or, you know. So it means we cannot even wear, like, shorts when we are jogging like sometime in the morning.
If I wear a miniskirt, or a skirt that higher than my knee, for example, the fine will be about 200 million rupiahs, up to 1 billion rupiahs - it's very high. I can be imprisoned for about four years, just because of that. I mean, that's even higher for many corruption case or rape, for example.
Activists like Yenny have lobbied parliament extensively against the bill. .
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI, (Translation): We women feel very offended sir, the spirit of this draft law makes women out to be the responsible for destroying the nations morals.
Parliamentarians looking at the bill say they're now considering a second draft but their new definition of pornography is still extremely wide - it's anything that arouses sexual desire.
HILLMAN ROYSAD, (Translation): What we call pornography is a work by a human being that is pornographic in nature in the form of illustrations, pictures or illustrations, photos, writing, sound, noise or in moving pictures, including animation, cartoons, poetry, conversations in the media and/or public performances that arouse sexual desires.
I asked Hillman Roysad if popular Indonesian performer Inul, known for her erotic dancing, would be banned if the legislation passed.
HILLMAN ROYSAD (Translation): It could well be, it depends on the definition. For example if it contains pornographic elements in the sense that it imitates coitus or such things, then that would be forbidden. But if you want to dance, go ahead, as long as there is no pornographic elements in the dancing it won't be banned.
At the headquarters of the Islamic Defenders Front, members are leafing through a 'Playboy' magazine. This radical Islamic group is a front-line supporter of the bill.
MAN, (Translation): And now I've heard news it was available in Jakarta, and to prove it, I went looking for it on the side of the road, and I found it. I was shocked it meant that Playboy was freely available.
Public morality has long been an obsession of the Islamic Defenders Front. They're notorious for their self-styled vigilante raids on nightclubs and bars. In their fight to support the anti-pornography bill, they've been accused by women's groups of harassment and intimidation. Their leader, Habib Riziq - who's been gaoled for inciting hatred - says opponents of the bill are really out to subvert Indonesian culture.
HABIB RIZIIQ, ISLAMIC DEFENDERS FRONT LEADER, (Translation): Yes, there are certain groups who are trying to scuttle the draft law by invoking freedom and human rights, as I said earlier. This group is trying to westernise Indonesian culture in the name of liberation of culture, in the name of freedom. However, we think that these efforts to liberalise Indonesian culture are extremely dangerous.
Habib Riziq is coming to speak at a mosque in Jakarta. Also here is another Islamic civilian militia group that's fighting to have the bill passed - the Betawi Brotherhood Forum. This group, with their matching leather jackets, has conducted actions such as besieging the house of pop star Inul.
Their leader, Fadloli el-Muhir, is clearly not averse to making threats.
FADLOLI EL- MUHIR, BETAWI BROTHERHOOD FORUM, (Translation): The entire Muslim community agrees the law should be passed. Praise be.. to God! The police asked me about a threat Id made Id said If parliament doesn't pass this law, I will strip any MP who voted against it and march them naked through Jakarta. The police asked me Is that true? Yes I said. You are scaring the people, this is intimidation. That is what you call it. I think those who oppose good are devils, we must fight them.
These hardline Islamic groups see the anti-pornography bill as a vehicle for achieving their moral aims.
FADLOLI EL- MUHIR, (Translation): Now leys take a look at the way Muslims dress. Wati is 18-years-old but she wears baby clothes her skirts a hand span long, she rides in mini-buses with her tits hanging out, you can see her crotch. This throws us, if I saw Wati passing even I might do something rash. Am I right? By God, members of the congregation..if I was to see her I would rush straight home, Ive got a wife, I can grab her, thats not wrong, is it? But if you are not married, what will you grab? We should say to them, Hey, you are my wife, you can undress for me in the bedroom. But if you go out, from your head to your calves must all be covered."
As protests against the bill have vividly displayed, the Indonesian archipelago incorporates many cultures and religions. Opponents of the bill are gravely concerned it's an attempt to enforce sharia, or Islamic religious law, upon the whole country.
The former first lady Sinta Nuriyah Wahid says the bill poses a grave danger to the official state philosophy of Pancasila that promotes diversity.
SINTA NURIYAH WAHID, FORMER FIRST LADY (Translation): Because this draft bill has the potential to enforce cultural uniformity and is a form of betrayal and a breach of the foundations of the state, the constitution, the Pancasila, and "Unity in Diversity" and it may lead to national disintegration.
While his party has supported sharia law in the past, Hillman Roysad denies the anti-pornography bill is about introducing Islamic law, but says that Islam should influence law in Indonesia.
HILLMAN ROYSAD, (Translation): You have to understand Indonesia , most Indonesians are Muslim. The constitution says that our state is based on belief in God, belief in the truth of religion. So when we make regulations it is legitimate to include religious considerations, especially in todays democratic world.
There is undoubtedly a push from some conservative and hardline Islamic groups to introduce Islamic-style laws into secular Indonesia. Across Indonesia, around 20 local government areas have already introduced by-laws inspired by sharia law, for example, making headscarves compulsory for women, and banning alcohol consumption and immodest clothing.
Here, in a satellite city of Jakarta called Tangerang, the local mayor, who's a member of an Islamist party, has introduced laws prohibiting alcohol and prostitution. The new law on prostitution allows women to be arrested on suspicion alone. Critics say it's designed to restrict the activities of all women.
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI: Basically, the law in Tangerang actually is also something like a curfew for women, because any women can be suspected as a prostitute if they walk alone or walk not without any male family members with them after 9:00 in the evening.
Lilis Lindawati is one woman who's felt the full impact of these new laws. In February this year she was waiting at a bus stop in Tangerang at night when local police stopped her and accused her of being a sex worker.
LILIS, (Translation): I said "I am not a sex worker I was going home from work. I said Im not a sex worker, I have a husband and children." But they didn't believe me.
Lilis says she's too scared to leave the house much now, but agrees to come with us from her village to the city of Tangerang to show us what happened to her that night.
LILIS (Translation): When that happened to me I went into shock and didn't go out any more. Even going to Tangerang to do the shopping I don't dare to that anymore even if it's during the day I'm scared and traumatised.
As we're driving, we come across the local "public order" police out on patrol ? It's their job to implement the new law and find suspected sex workers. By chance, this is the same patrol that picked up Lilis.
LILIS (Translation): That woman facing us, Id like to get back at her. She pushed me into the car, I struggled but couldn't get out.
Lilis was arrested at the bus stop with more than 10 other women. After being bundled into the police van, she was taken to a holding cell.
REPORTER: The next day Lilis was taken here, to the forecourt outside the local mayor's office. Without a lawyer, and before a crowd of local people, she faced trial. Lilis will only look at the scene of her public humiliation from the safety of the car.
LILIS, (Translation): There, that's the place, in the middle, in the middle. I don't want to look. We were put on show, people laughed at us. They laughed and jeered at us, I was really embarrassed.
Around 13 other women were also tried that day, under the same circumstances as Lilis. Looking like a show trial, with no sign of a defence lawyer, woman after woman was found guilty of prostitution. When it was Lilis's turn, the judge asked to see in her handbag.
LILIS (Translation): They wanted to check my bag and they found powder and lipstick. They said, there's powder and lipstick in here, you say you are a worker, but you're lying. You could be just claiming to a worker, when in fact you are a sex worker., I said your honour, I'm sorry yes, I do take lipstick to work with me, before I go home I like to tidy myself up, I like to get made up, how come I'm not allowed to wear powder and lipstick. And then because of these ( eyebrows..) once I'd answered the question about the powder an lipstick. Its your eyebrows. they said.Its your eyebrows, if you are not a sex worker why can we see your eyebrows are like that.
Based on the fact she was out at night, and her incriminating make-up, Lilis was found guilty. Unable to pay the fine of around A$50, she spent the next three nights in prison.
Dozens of women have been arrested in Tangerang since the new laws came into effect. Local human rights workers say some women were likely to be sex workers, but others were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. .
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI: The thing behind that law to eradicate that prostitution is based on a rigid interpretation of morality in Islam, for example, like, only bad women out of the house after 9pm without any male family members.
Tangerang's Mayor refused to talk to Dateline, though a spokesman says the laws are not influenced by sharia or Islamic law.
LILIS, (Translation): Women tell me they are scared to go out now. If they are out on their own they fear theyll be arrested too.
Since her arrest, Lilis has taken to wearing a Muslim headscarf called the jilbab. Based on her experience, she thinks in Tangerang now it's a safer option.
LILIS, (Translation): No one wearing a jilbab was arrested, women not wearing these got arrested, even women buying rambutans were arrested, as I was getting into the vehicle someone else got arrested and she was carrying rambutans. But the ones who were standing there for ages wearing jilbabs didn't get arrested, that's the amazing thing. So now I wear a jilbab, so I don't need to be afraid.
There is a serious challenge under way to the secular nature of Indonesian society.
HABIB RIZIQ, (Translation): You know in the grounds of the National Palace, they don't allow mosques.! But the mosque is the symbol of religion. This idea is called secularism and secularism is dangerous. Isn't it? A deviation. It's not Islam.
More than 50 members of parliament have signed a letter calling on the President to overrule all local regulations based on Islamic law. Former president and one-time leader of Indonesia's largest Muslim organisation Abdurrahman Wahid says the sharia-inspired laws are actually illegal.
REPORTER: Do you think, for example, the laws in Tangerang do violate the constitution?
ABDURRAHMAN WAHID, FORMER PRESIDENT OF INDONESIA: Yes.
REPORTER: In what way?
ABDURRAHMAN WAHID: Because they condone only one type of law or morality, while in essence our Pancasila constitution says that we shall be multicultural.
REPORTER: Has the current President been strong enough on this issue, do you think?
ABDURRAHMAN WAHID: No, no, no. We are of the same, similar opinions but he doesn't have the courage to carry out the laws or regulations.
As to the fate of the contentious anti-pornography bill, it looks like it will pass through parliament, with amendments, in the next few weeks. Just who will be dancing in the street once it does remains to be seen.
REPORTER/CAMERA: Bronwyn Adcock.
EDITOR: Rowan Tucker-Evans.
SUBTITLING: Robyn Fallic, Stephanus Dharmanto.
PRODUCER: Martin Butler.
Like many capital cities around the world, Jakarta has its red light district. After midnight, sex workers ply their trade and pornography is easy to find.
MAN: You like blue 'Indonesia'.
REPORTER: Yeah. What have you got?
MAN: 'Indonesia 1', 'Indonesia 3'. Indonesian porn?
Right now, pornography and sex are the subject of intense public debate in Indonesia, as one of the most controversial pieces of legislation ever seen here is considered by parliament. Known as the anti-pornography bill it has considerable political support, including from the Islamist Prosperous Justice Party. Hillman Roysad.
HILLMAN ROYSAD, ISLAMIST PROSPEROUS JUSTICE PARTY, (Translation): We know that pornography is dangerous, very dangerous. For individuals , the public, for children, for teenagers and so on. That's one thing. And the second thing is the fact that porn in Indonesia is too freely available
The bill regulates the distribution of pornography and much more, potentially changing the lives of all Indonesian women.
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI, UNITY AND DIVERSITY ALLIANCE: Well, the main problem is that it not only regulate the pornography, it regulate the way we behave, it regulate the way we dress, it regulate the way we conduct things.
Activist Yenny Rosa Damayanti is part of a broad coalition opposing the bill because of its attempts to regulate public morality, such as banning kissing in public and revealing clothes. .
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI: It say that it's considered as a criminal offence if you wear something that show your navel, your thigh, part of your breast or, you know. So it means we cannot even wear, like, shorts when we are jogging like sometime in the morning.
If I wear a miniskirt, or a skirt that higher than my knee, for example, the fine will be about 200 million rupiahs, up to 1 billion rupiahs - it's very high. I can be imprisoned for about four years, just because of that. I mean, that's even higher for many corruption case or rape, for example.
Activists like Yenny have lobbied parliament extensively against the bill. .
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI, (Translation): We women feel very offended sir, the spirit of this draft law makes women out to be the responsible for destroying the nations morals.
Parliamentarians looking at the bill say they're now considering a second draft but their new definition of pornography is still extremely wide - it's anything that arouses sexual desire.
HILLMAN ROYSAD, (Translation): What we call pornography is a work by a human being that is pornographic in nature in the form of illustrations, pictures or illustrations, photos, writing, sound, noise or in moving pictures, including animation, cartoons, poetry, conversations in the media and/or public performances that arouse sexual desires.
I asked Hillman Roysad if popular Indonesian performer Inul, known for her erotic dancing, would be banned if the legislation passed.
HILLMAN ROYSAD (Translation): It could well be, it depends on the definition. For example if it contains pornographic elements in the sense that it imitates coitus or such things, then that would be forbidden. But if you want to dance, go ahead, as long as there is no pornographic elements in the dancing it won't be banned.
At the headquarters of the Islamic Defenders Front, members are leafing through a 'Playboy' magazine. This radical Islamic group is a front-line supporter of the bill.
MAN, (Translation): And now I've heard news it was available in Jakarta, and to prove it, I went looking for it on the side of the road, and I found it. I was shocked it meant that Playboy was freely available.
Public morality has long been an obsession of the Islamic Defenders Front. They're notorious for their self-styled vigilante raids on nightclubs and bars. In their fight to support the anti-pornography bill, they've been accused by women's groups of harassment and intimidation. Their leader, Habib Riziq - who's been gaoled for inciting hatred - says opponents of the bill are really out to subvert Indonesian culture.
HABIB RIZIIQ, ISLAMIC DEFENDERS FRONT LEADER, (Translation): Yes, there are certain groups who are trying to scuttle the draft law by invoking freedom and human rights, as I said earlier. This group is trying to westernise Indonesian culture in the name of liberation of culture, in the name of freedom. However, we think that these efforts to liberalise Indonesian culture are extremely dangerous.
Habib Riziq is coming to speak at a mosque in Jakarta. Also here is another Islamic civilian militia group that's fighting to have the bill passed - the Betawi Brotherhood Forum. This group, with their matching leather jackets, has conducted actions such as besieging the house of pop star Inul.
Their leader, Fadloli el-Muhir, is clearly not averse to making threats.
FADLOLI EL- MUHIR, BETAWI BROTHERHOOD FORUM, (Translation): The entire Muslim community agrees the law should be passed. Praise be.. to God! The police asked me about a threat Id made Id said If parliament doesn't pass this law, I will strip any MP who voted against it and march them naked through Jakarta. The police asked me Is that true? Yes I said. You are scaring the people, this is intimidation. That is what you call it. I think those who oppose good are devils, we must fight them.
These hardline Islamic groups see the anti-pornography bill as a vehicle for achieving their moral aims.
FADLOLI EL- MUHIR, (Translation): Now leys take a look at the way Muslims dress. Wati is 18-years-old but she wears baby clothes her skirts a hand span long, she rides in mini-buses with her tits hanging out, you can see her crotch. This throws us, if I saw Wati passing even I might do something rash. Am I right? By God, members of the congregation..if I was to see her I would rush straight home, Ive got a wife, I can grab her, thats not wrong, is it? But if you are not married, what will you grab? We should say to them, Hey, you are my wife, you can undress for me in the bedroom. But if you go out, from your head to your calves must all be covered."
As protests against the bill have vividly displayed, the Indonesian archipelago incorporates many cultures and religions. Opponents of the bill are gravely concerned it's an attempt to enforce sharia, or Islamic religious law, upon the whole country.
The former first lady Sinta Nuriyah Wahid says the bill poses a grave danger to the official state philosophy of Pancasila that promotes diversity.
SINTA NURIYAH WAHID, FORMER FIRST LADY (Translation): Because this draft bill has the potential to enforce cultural uniformity and is a form of betrayal and a breach of the foundations of the state, the constitution, the Pancasila, and "Unity in Diversity" and it may lead to national disintegration.
While his party has supported sharia law in the past, Hillman Roysad denies the anti-pornography bill is about introducing Islamic law, but says that Islam should influence law in Indonesia.
HILLMAN ROYSAD, (Translation): You have to understand Indonesia , most Indonesians are Muslim. The constitution says that our state is based on belief in God, belief in the truth of religion. So when we make regulations it is legitimate to include religious considerations, especially in todays democratic world.
There is undoubtedly a push from some conservative and hardline Islamic groups to introduce Islamic-style laws into secular Indonesia. Across Indonesia, around 20 local government areas have already introduced by-laws inspired by sharia law, for example, making headscarves compulsory for women, and banning alcohol consumption and immodest clothing.
Here, in a satellite city of Jakarta called Tangerang, the local mayor, who's a member of an Islamist party, has introduced laws prohibiting alcohol and prostitution. The new law on prostitution allows women to be arrested on suspicion alone. Critics say it's designed to restrict the activities of all women.
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI: Basically, the law in Tangerang actually is also something like a curfew for women, because any women can be suspected as a prostitute if they walk alone or walk not without any male family members with them after 9:00 in the evening.
Lilis Lindawati is one woman who's felt the full impact of these new laws. In February this year she was waiting at a bus stop in Tangerang at night when local police stopped her and accused her of being a sex worker.
LILIS, (Translation): I said "I am not a sex worker I was going home from work. I said Im not a sex worker, I have a husband and children." But they didn't believe me.
Lilis says she's too scared to leave the house much now, but agrees to come with us from her village to the city of Tangerang to show us what happened to her that night.
LILIS (Translation): When that happened to me I went into shock and didn't go out any more. Even going to Tangerang to do the shopping I don't dare to that anymore even if it's during the day I'm scared and traumatised.
As we're driving, we come across the local "public order" police out on patrol ? It's their job to implement the new law and find suspected sex workers. By chance, this is the same patrol that picked up Lilis.
LILIS (Translation): That woman facing us, Id like to get back at her. She pushed me into the car, I struggled but couldn't get out.
Lilis was arrested at the bus stop with more than 10 other women. After being bundled into the police van, she was taken to a holding cell.
REPORTER: The next day Lilis was taken here, to the forecourt outside the local mayor's office. Without a lawyer, and before a crowd of local people, she faced trial. Lilis will only look at the scene of her public humiliation from the safety of the car.
LILIS, (Translation): There, that's the place, in the middle, in the middle. I don't want to look. We were put on show, people laughed at us. They laughed and jeered at us, I was really embarrassed.
Around 13 other women were also tried that day, under the same circumstances as Lilis. Looking like a show trial, with no sign of a defence lawyer, woman after woman was found guilty of prostitution. When it was Lilis's turn, the judge asked to see in her handbag.
LILIS (Translation): They wanted to check my bag and they found powder and lipstick. They said, there's powder and lipstick in here, you say you are a worker, but you're lying. You could be just claiming to a worker, when in fact you are a sex worker., I said your honour, I'm sorry yes, I do take lipstick to work with me, before I go home I like to tidy myself up, I like to get made up, how come I'm not allowed to wear powder and lipstick. And then because of these ( eyebrows..) once I'd answered the question about the powder an lipstick. Its your eyebrows. they said.Its your eyebrows, if you are not a sex worker why can we see your eyebrows are like that.
Based on the fact she was out at night, and her incriminating make-up, Lilis was found guilty. Unable to pay the fine of around A$50, she spent the next three nights in prison.
Dozens of women have been arrested in Tangerang since the new laws came into effect. Local human rights workers say some women were likely to be sex workers, but others were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. .
YENNY ROSA DAMAYANTI: The thing behind that law to eradicate that prostitution is based on a rigid interpretation of morality in Islam, for example, like, only bad women out of the house after 9pm without any male family members.
Tangerang's Mayor refused to talk to Dateline, though a spokesman says the laws are not influenced by sharia or Islamic law.
LILIS, (Translation): Women tell me they are scared to go out now. If they are out on their own they fear theyll be arrested too.
Since her arrest, Lilis has taken to wearing a Muslim headscarf called the jilbab. Based on her experience, she thinks in Tangerang now it's a safer option.
LILIS, (Translation): No one wearing a jilbab was arrested, women not wearing these got arrested, even women buying rambutans were arrested, as I was getting into the vehicle someone else got arrested and she was carrying rambutans. But the ones who were standing there for ages wearing jilbabs didn't get arrested, that's the amazing thing. So now I wear a jilbab, so I don't need to be afraid.
There is a serious challenge under way to the secular nature of Indonesian society.
HABIB RIZIQ, (Translation): You know in the grounds of the National Palace, they don't allow mosques.! But the mosque is the symbol of religion. This idea is called secularism and secularism is dangerous. Isn't it? A deviation. It's not Islam.
More than 50 members of parliament have signed a letter calling on the President to overrule all local regulations based on Islamic law. Former president and one-time leader of Indonesia's largest Muslim organisation Abdurrahman Wahid says the sharia-inspired laws are actually illegal.
REPORTER: Do you think, for example, the laws in Tangerang do violate the constitution?
ABDURRAHMAN WAHID, FORMER PRESIDENT OF INDONESIA: Yes.
REPORTER: In what way?
ABDURRAHMAN WAHID: Because they condone only one type of law or morality, while in essence our Pancasila constitution says that we shall be multicultural.
REPORTER: Has the current President been strong enough on this issue, do you think?
ABDURRAHMAN WAHID: No, no, no. We are of the same, similar opinions but he doesn't have the courage to carry out the laws or regulations.
As to the fate of the contentious anti-pornography bill, it looks like it will pass through parliament, with amendments, in the next few weeks. Just who will be dancing in the street once it does remains to be seen.
REPORTER/CAMERA: Bronwyn Adcock.
EDITOR: Rowan Tucker-Evans.
SUBTITLING: Robyn Fallic, Stephanus Dharmanto.
PRODUCER: Martin Butler.