Central Management Board of the Star and Crescent Party, represented by Yusril Ihza Mahendra and Hamdan Zoelva, Tuesday (2/12), filed a lawsuit for a judicial review on Act No.42/2008 about Presidential General Election to the Constitutional Court.

“We will review the content of Article 3 paragraph (5) and Article 9 paragraph (5) of the Act on Presidential Election. Both stipulations, basically, regulate about separated implementation of the Election between the Legislative Election and the Presidential one, also about the requirement for proposing candidate which could only be done by political party with minimum of 20 percent seats in the Parliament or minimum of 25 percent of votes nationwide,” revealed Yusril in the Constitutional Court Press Conference Room.

According to Yusril, his party considered the legislative election and the presidential election conducted separatedly was against Article 22E Paragraph (1) and (2) of the 1945 Constitution regulating that the general election was held once in five years. Meanwhile, the 20 percent as well as the 25 percent requirements for proposing a presidential candidate pair was considered against Article 6A Paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution which only regulated political party to propose a single ticket presidential candidate without another additional requirement.

Supporting Yusril s statement, the Legal Counsel of the Star and Crescent Party, Hamdan Zoelva, told that his side had studied the transcripts of all the 1945 Constitution Amendment. “In the transcripts we can see, there was not a single fraction proposing the legislative and presidential election to be held in separated occassion. The 20 percent and the 25 percent requirements did not even cross our (members of the Higher Parliament) mind when we were preparing the change in the Constitution," explained the member of the Higher Parliament.

Hamdan also added that it was very difficult for any political parties to get 20 percent of share in the seats of the House of Representatives. In 1999 election, only Golkar Party managed to reach the limit. “However, in that election, the political fact showed that the candidate pair proposed by a party with 20 percent seats, lost. In fact, the candidate backed by Democrat Party with less than 10 percent share won,“ reminded Yusril supporting his previous argument. (Kencana Suluh Hikmah)

Photo: Doc. MK PR/Yogi Dj

Translated by Yogi Djatnika / MK