Folks did the research on Indonesian law back in 2009 when this was a hot topic.
The law in question is Law No. 62 of 1958, Law on the Citizenship of the Republic of Indonesia, 62/1958 for short. Assuming an adoption took place, it would fall under Article 2 of this law.
“Article 2.
(1)A foreign child of less than 5 years age who is adopted by a citizen of the Republic of Indonesia acquires the citizenship of the Republic of Indonesia, if such an adoption is declared legal by the Pengadilan Negeri at the residence of the person adopting the child.”
Note the age limit there - less than 5 years of age. Lolo Soetoro married Stanley Ann Dunham in 1967. This would have made Obama six years old - over the age limit according to Indonesian law.The Soetoros didn’t move to Indonesia until 1967, when Obama was six years old.
He needed to be under five.
US law doesn’t allow parents to renounce US citizenship for their children.
That’s a very good summary, and thank you for the information. It appears to me, though, that it might be talking about the automatic granting of citizenship to children, and that could only be done if they were under age 5.
The reason for an automatic grant of citizenship after an adoption would be to aid the intent of the parents to have their newly adopted child incorporated into the life of their nation.
The reason for not granting AUTOMATIC citizenship to one over 5 would be some sense that they might have developed an attachment already to their country of origin and would in later years look unkindly on it being stripped from them.
For this reason, it might have been possible for a child to voluntarily renounce his citizenship in order to gain Indonesian citizenship. Obama stayed in Indonesia until he was 10 years old.
It is unlikely, but possible due to either peer or cultural influence, that he felt compelled to renounce his US citizenship on his own.
That does not appear to be prohibited by the law you cite.
It doesn’t seem likely to me, but it is a possibility that your law doesn’t seem to cover, since that law appears to be talking about automatic conferring of citizenship.