Indonesia Conference Directory

Yogyakarta Sultanate is recognized by the 1945 Constitution as a special regional government unit. The leader of Special Region of Yogyakarta, Sri Sultan Hamengkubuwono X, has dual position, namely as the Governor as well as the King. The dual position of Sri Sultan Hamengkubuwono X has raised several classical problems, e.g. the term of office of the Governor, the establishment of the mechanism of the Sultan to be the Governor, accountability of the Governor, and the standard of carrying out daily tasks. This normative research examines the position of the Governor based on the 1945 Constitution of the Republic of Indonesia and the Paugeran of the Sultanate of Yogyakarta. The research shows that firstly, the dual position of Sultan had prompted conflict after the Constitutional Court decided that a woman can also be the Sultan of Yogyakarta, while the Paugeran of the Sultanate asserted that the Sultan must be a man. In addition, the Sultan tries to settle the issue of succession by declaring "Sabda Raja" (the Royal Proclamation) which given an opportunity to his daughter becomes the Sultan. However, the other family of Sultan rejects the idea of having a woman as the Sultan of Yogyakarta. Thirdly, the vacuum of internal disputes settlement mechanism in the Sultanate of Yogyakarta has made the issue of succession become unresolved until today since both conflicting parties do not yet meet the consensus on how to resolve the problems. The research recommends that the Sultanate Family of Yogyakarta needs to have a royal meeting which involves all families of the Sultanate to decide the problem