Constitutional Court Decision 184/PUU-XXIII/2025 is a 2026 ruling of the Constitutional Court of Indonesia on a challenge to the licensing basis of mineral and coal mining: Pasal 35(1) of the Mineral and Coal Mining Law as amended by Undang-Undang 2/2025, under which mining business is carried out on the basis of a business licence from the central government, and Pasal 92 as amended by Undang-Undang 3/2020, on the ownership of minerals and coal produced by permit holders.^[1][2] The petition was brought by six individuals, among them law students, a fisher and members of customary-law communities living near tin and nickel mines, who asked the Court to allow state control of mining to be exercised through contracts or cooperation schemes.^[2:1][3] It is one of the constitutional review cases in the field of mining and energy regulation pronounced by the Court on 16 July 2026.^[4]

The Court declared the challenge to Pasal 92 unclear, because the petition quoted a wording of that article different from the text as enacted.^[5] On Pasal 35(1) it held that licensing, as an instrument of administrative law, gives effect to the state's right of control under Pasal 33 of the 1945 Constitution better than a contract regime, in which the state stands as an equal party bound by the contract's terms.^[6][7] The operative order declared the petition inadmissible as to Pasal 92 and rejected it for the remainder.^[4:1]

¶ Background

The Court traced the move from contracts to licences. Under Undang-Undang 11/1967 on the basic provisions of mining and Undang-Undang 1/1967 on foreign investment, the government offered foreign investors contracts of work (kontrak karya), the first signed with PT Freeport Indonesia three months after the foreign investment law. Under that regime rights and obligations, profit sharing and fiscal terms were negotiated, any change required renegotiation, and breach could expose the government to arbitration; the Court found that this limited the state's room to regulate, for instance where contracts fixed tax and royalty rates for their whole term.^[8] Undang-Undang 4/2009 replaced the contract regime with licensing, and Undang-Undang 3/2020 and Undang-Undang 2/2025 amended it further; the Court summarised the result as a shift from a civil relationship to a public-law one, with policy set by statute rather than agreement and disputes heard by the administrative courts rather than international arbitration.^[9]

¶ Petition

The petition was received on 7 October 2025, registered on 8 October 2025 and revised in a filing received on 3 November 2025, after a preliminary examination on 20 October 2025.^[10][11] It argued that licensing left the state only as issuer of permits and collector of levies, gave permit holders full ownership of the output (ex situ ownership), shut the public out of decisions on mining, and prevented the state from setting a real contribution from production, contrary to Pasal 33(1) to (4) of the 1945 Constitution. Comparing the mining laws of several other states, it asked the Court to hold Pasal 35(1) unconstitutional, or unconstitutional unless read to allow state control through contracts or cooperation in the management of natural resources.^[3:1] The Court heard the House of Representatives, the President, and experts and witnesses called by both sides.^[12]

¶ Ruling

¶ Pasal 92

The petition twice quoted Pasal 92 as entitling permit holders to own the minerals or coal produced after paying production levies and taxes, and its relief described Undang-Undang 3/2020 as the "fourth" amendment of the mining statute. The Court held that the quotation did not match the article as promulgated on 10 June 2020, which entitles holders of an IUP or IUPK to own the minerals, including associated minerals, or coal they have produced after meeting production levies, except associated radioactive minerals, and that Undang-Undang 3/2020 was not the fourth amendment. Unable to identify the norm actually challenged, it declared this part of the petition unclear (obscuur) and did not consider it further.^{[13][5:1][14]}

¶ Pasal 35(1)

The Court first held that Pasal 35(1) could be reviewed again. Its predecessor in Undang-Undang 3/2020 had been challenged in decision 58/PUU-XVIII/2020, pronounced on 29 September 2020, which declared that petition inadmissible for lack of standing, and the present petition relied on different constitutional provisions and grounds.^[15] Citing decision 160/PUU-XXIII/2025, it described the state's right of control as a public-law relationship, and characterised licensing in administrative law doctrine as an instrument of control, supervision and order that must rest on express statutory authority.^[16][17]

Measuring the two regimes against the five functions of state control set out in decision 001-021-022/PUU-I/2003, the Court found that under licensing the state can set and change requirements, evaluate and supervise holders, impose graduated administrative sanctions and revoke permits, and can apply new environmental, reclamation, downstream-processing or domestic-supply policies without renegotiation. It restated that the management of natural resources for the greatest prosperity of the people cannot be conducted through civil relationships, which would limit the state's power. It added that licensing must be accompanied by better governance, transparency in permit awards, inter-agency coordination and consistent supervision and enforcement.^[6:1] It held that Pasal 35(1) conforms to the principle of state control and is not contrary to Pasal 33(1) to (4).^[7:1]

The operative order declared the petition inadmissible so far as it concerned Pasal 92 of Undang-Undang 3/2020 and rejected it for the remainder. The decision was reached in deliberation on 2 July 2026 and pronounced on 16 July 2026, with Suhartoyo presiding; no separate opinion is recorded.^[4:2]

¶ Relationship to other decisions

The ruling was pronounced the same afternoon as decision 160/PUU-XXIII/2025, which kept the licensing framework but required priority awards of permit areas to follow clear, objective and transparent parameters.^[18] Among the amendments made by Undang-Undang 2/2025, the Court noted the integrated electronic business licensing system of Pasal 35(5).^[9:1]

CRPG's regulatory tracker published an account of the decision on 16 August 2026.^[19] That account attributed to the Court a reading of Pasal 92 as confining ownership to output produced after levies are paid, and a quotation from decision 36/PUU-X/2012 on oil and gas contracts; neither appears in the Court's legal consideration, which declared the Pasal 92 challenge unclear.^[5:2][19:1]

¶ External links

• Decision (Mahkamah Konstitusi)
• Case record (Mahkamah Konstitusi)
• CRPG: Licensing Versus Contract in Mineral Ownership: MK 184/PUU-XXIII/2025 (crpg.id, 16 August 2026)

¶ References