Beyond Legal Status: Protection Gaps in Child Maintenance Following Marriage Annulment in Indonesia
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.53905/Veritas.v2i03.7Keywords:
marriage annulment, child protection, legal certainty, Compilation of Islamic Law, Religious Court decisionAbstract
Purpose of the study: This study aims to examine the legal considerations underlying judges' decisions to annul a marriage on the ground of a concealed prior marriage, and to analyze the legal consequences of marriage annulment for the status, custody, and maintenance rights of children born from the annulled union.
Methodology: This research employed normative-empirical legal research combining a statute approach and a case-study approach. The primary legal materials consisted of Law No. 1 of 1974 on Marriage, the Compilation of Islamic Law (Kompilasi Hukum Islam), Law No. 35 of 2014 on Child Protection, and Religious Court Decision No. 1446/Pdt.G/2017/PA.Mks. Secondary data were obtained through semi-structured interviews with a judge of the Religious Court Class 1A of Makassar and through documentary study of statutory instruments and prior scholarship. Data were analyzed descriptively-qualitatively.
Results: The judge's legal consideration in Decision No. 1446/Pdt.G/2017/PA.Mks was found to rest strictly on the juridical fact that the husband (Defendant I) was still bound by a valid, undissolved prior marriage at the time of contracting the second marriage, which constitutes an absolute ground for annulment under Article 24 of Law No. 1/1974. Pursuant to Article 28(1)(a) of Law No. 1/1974 and Article 75(b) of the Compilation of Islamic Law, the annulment was declared non-retroactive with respect to the children born from the annulled marriage, thereby preserving their civil status, nasab (lineage), and inheritance rights. However, the verdict (amar putusan) did not explicitly impose maintenance and custodial obligations on Defendant I, leaving Defendant II and the child without an enforceable, self-executing basis for support.
Conclusions: While Indonesian marriage law protects children born from an annulled marriage from retroactive loss of legal status, protection remains incomplete because judges are not statutorily compelled to specify the father's maintenance obligations in the operative part of the decision. Strengthening the integration of marriage-registration data among Religious Affairs Offices (KUA) and mandating explicit maintenance clauses in annulment verdicts are recommended to close this protection gap.
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