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Indonesia’s international investment policy has been in the spotlight since the Government of Indonesia (the “GOI”) conveyed in 2014 its intention to terminate all of its existing bilateral investment treaties (“BITs”). This announcement has raised concerns among current and prospective foreign investors in Indonesia, since BITs provide the foundation for protection against governmental expropriation and nationalisation. Most BITs also offer an investor-state dispute settlement mechanism that can and has played a decisive factor for foreign investors to invest in developing countries such as Indonesia.
True to its announced intention, in 2015 the GOI terminated existing BITs with several countries, a move that received a negative response from the international community. These countries were the Netherlands, Bulgaria, China, France, Italy, Laos, Malaysia, and Slovakia. In addition, Indonesia delivered diplomatic notes in 2015 to India, Cambodia, Romania, Turkey, Spain, Hungary and Vietnam conveying its intention to terminate its BITs with those countries in 2016.
Indonesia’s former Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs, Mr Sofyan Djalil, shed light during his tenure on the reason behind such terminations. He attributed the terminations to the unsuitability and irrelevancy of the BITs with Indonesia’s current development and that, as a result, the BITs needed to be reviewed, with termination being a necessary precursor to that end. In addition, he said that several arbitration disputes had been brought against Indonesia and the preliminary decisions had been unfair and contrary to Indonesia’s interests. At the same time, the GOI has indicated that it does not intend to withdraw from BITs permanently but will concurrently with the terminations seek to renegotiate the investment treaties.
The Indonesian Investment Coordinating Board (Badan Koordinasi Penanaman Modal or “BKPM”) has reported that the GOI is currently drafting a new model BIT for that purpose or renegotiating the investment treaties. There is little information regarding the draft model BIT. However, according to the BKPM, the draft will limit BIT terms to ten years and will exclude the “automatic renewal” provision that is usually contained in BITs. According to the BKPM, the draft model BIT is scheduled to be finalised and proposed in 2016.
For existing foreign investors from countries whose BITs have been terminated by Indonesia, such terminations do not necessarily mean they will immediately lose the protection of the BITs, since most BITs have a “survival” or “sunset” clause that provides the BIT will survive termination for a certain period of time. The sunset period is different under each BIT.
SSEK - 13th june 2016
Capital: Jakarta
Population: 259 million (2016)
Currency: Indonesian Rupiah
Nominal GDP: $936 billion USD (IMF, 2016)
GDP Per Capita: $3,620 USD at Current Prices (IMF, 2016)
GDP Growth: 5.0% (2016)
External Debt: 36.80% of GDP (BI, Q2 2016)
Ease of Doing Business: 91/190 (WB, 2017)
Corruption Index: 90/176 (TI, 2016)
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