INDONESIA Law and Practice Contributed by: Emir Nurmansyah, Theodoor Bakker, Ulyarta Naibaho and Adithya Lesmana, ABNR Counsellors at Law
decided (Article 34, Arbitration Law). The parties may agree on a particular set of rules on arbitrator selec - tion, provided that the rules are not contradictory to the Arbitration Law nor to the appointment rules of the national or international arbitration institution they have selected. If the chosen method for selecting arbi - trators fails or the parties do not choose a selection method, the chair of the district court will have author - ity to appoint the members of the arbitral tribunal. Specifically for ad hoc arbitration, the Arbitration Law provides that the parties may seek the assistance of the chair of the district court to appoint the members of the arbitral tribunal if they fail to do so themselves. However, if the parties agree to specific institutional arbitration rules or set out their own rules, these will apply as the default procedure, provided they do not contradict the Arbitration Law. The Arbitration Law provides that the tasks of the arbi - trators end when: • an award has been issued; • the deadlines determined in the arbitration agree - ment have been exceeded; or • the parties have agreed to withdraw their dispute from arbitration. The law specifies that the death of one of the par - ties does not in itself affect the arbitration procedure, although the term of office of arbitrators will automati - cally be extended by 60 days in such an event. 4.3 Court Intervention During the appointment process, the court can inter - vene in the selection of arbitrators if: • one of the events described in Article 13 of the Arbitration Law occurs (see 4.2 Default Proce- dures ); or • a recusal filed by one party is objected to by the other party or parties, or the member of the arbitral tribunal concerned fails to step down. Thereafter, the court can only address the issue of the jurisdiction and competence of an arbitral tribu -
nal within the framework of enforcement of the award through a writ of execution (exequatur). 4.4 Challenge and Removal of Arbitrators Section III of the Arbitration Law and Articles 4–5 of Supreme Court Reg No 3/2023 stipulate the provi - sions governing the challenge or removal of arbitra - tors, and contain the requirements for a challenge or removal of members of an arbitral tribunal by the par - ties or by the chair of the district court. A request to recuse members of an arbitral tribunal can be filed with the relevant district court if: • there is sufficient cause or authentic evidence that raises doubt as to whether the arbitrator will per - form the task independently, neutrally and impar - tially when rendering an award; or • it is proven that the arbitrator has a family, work or financial relationship with one or more of the par - ties or their legal counsel. 4.5 Arbitrator Requirements Under the Arbitration Law, each member of the arbitral tribunal must be independent, neutral and impartial, as outlined in 4.1 Limits on Selection , but there are no specific references to the requirement for independ - ence, impartiality and/or disclosure of a potential con - flict. BANI has adopted a similar requirement, yet it also does not have specific references. If the appointment of arbitrators is complete, then an arbitrator cannot be released from their duties other than with the agreement of the disputing parties. If the parties agree, then the arbitrator is released. If they disagree, the issue of the release can be submitted to the district court chair for final decision.
5. Jurisdiction 5.1 Challenges to Jurisdiction
An arbitral tribunal is authorised to rule on a party’s challenge to the tribunal’s jurisdiction (the compe - tence-competence principle). The principle is gener - ally accepted even though the Arbitration Law does not specifically confirm it. The applicability of this principle can be inferred from Articles 3 and 11 of the
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