Indonesia to revoke 3,200 bylaws

JAKARTA: Indonesia will revoke more than 3,200 bylaws, including some local restrictions on the sale of alcoholic drinks, in a bid to streamline legislation, reports said Saturday.
"We will revoke the bylaws because they conflict with other regulations and laws," Home Affairs Minister Tjahjo Kumolo was quoted as saying by the Kompas newspaper.
Tjahjo said many of the bylaws had become disincentives to investment and development.
Faced with a slowing economy, the government of President Joko Widodo is trying to clean up the bureacracy to attract more investment.
Joko has said that many bylaws were "burdensome" both to local populations and businesses.
In some localities, Muslim civil servants and students are required by law to wear Islamic clothing, while a local government in mainly-Christian West Papua province has sought to restrict the building of mosques and the wearing of Muslim headscarves.
Experts have attributed the phenomenon to the devolution of legislative authority to the districts and provinces as part of the intensive decentralisation following the fall of autocratic president Suharto in 1998. — dpa