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Petitioner Sidik (right) following the revision hearing of the judicial review of Law Number 13 of 2019 on the Third Amendment to Law Number 17 of 2014 on the People\'s Consultative Assembly, the Regional Representatives Council, and the Regional Legislative Council, Monday (25/11) in the Plenary Courtroom of the Constitutional Court. Photo by Humas MK/Ifa.

JAKARTA, Public Relations of the Constitutional Court—The Constitutional Court (MK) held the revision hearing of the judicial review of Law Number 13 of 2019 on the Third Amendment to Law Number 17 of 2014 on the People\'s Consultative Assembly (MPR), the Regional Representatives Council (DPD), and the Regional Legislative Council (DPRD), also known as the MD3 Law, on Monday (25/11/2019) in the Plenary Courtroom of the Constitutional Court. The hearing of case No. 66/PUU-XVII/2019 was presided over by Chief Constitutional Justice Anwar Usman, with Constitutional Justices Manahan M. P. Sitompul and Enny Nurbaningsih.

Petitioner Sidik, who is an advocate, delivered the revised petition. The Petitioners changed the status of the judicial review from formal and added Law Number 8 of 2011 on the Amendment to Law Number 24 of 2003 on the Constitutional Court (MK Law).

The Petitioners also stressed that the time for the Petitioners to file for a formal review of the law, which is 45 days after the law is promulgated in the State Gazette. They also outlined the correlation between the Petitioners’ interests and the law petitioned for review as suggested by the justices at the preliminary examination hearing on Monday (11/11/2019).

In the preliminary hearing, Petitioner I Sidik said that their constitutional damage is focused on the mandate from the Petitioners/individual citizens to the Parliament to carry out their duties fairly, honestly, and responsible for the interests of the people. "The granting of the mandate [does not mean] the people\'s sovereignty is transferred to the Indonesian Parliament, [but] the sovereignty remains in the hands of the people," he said.

The constitutional loss in the formal review is proven if the Petitioners feel that the House (DPR) has not carried out fiduciary duties that mandated by the people fairly, honestly, and responsibly, even though the Petitioners used their right to vote to elect members of the House in the general elections.

Sidik believes that the 1945 Constitution does not regulate mandatory approval of the House and the President. If the formulation of laws reviewed formally against the 1945 Constitution, they would not be unconstitutional since they are always approved by both institutions before being promulgated.

He added that the formulation of the Third Amendment to the MD3 Law violated the procedure as regulated in the House code of conduct as it was not included in the 2015-2019 National Legislative Program (Prolegnas) or the 2019 Prolegnas priority list. If the Bill of the Third Amendment to the MD3 Law had been submitted outside of the Prolegnas, it could only have been proposed by the House and the President.

Sidik considered the change in Article 15 of the MD3 Law not driven by the need to fill a legal vacuum or a critical situation. On the contrary, the Petitioners believe they tend to accommodate the political interests of political parties, giving each political party faction one leading position in the MPR, be it Chairperson or Deputy Chairperson.

In their petition, the Petitioners also argued that Law Number 13 of 2019 is not supported by sociologically and philosophically qualified academic texts. They concluded that the Third Amendment to the MD3 Law does not meet the principles of the formation of legislation or, in other words, that it followed a flawed procedure.

Therefore, the Petitioners requested that the Constitutional Court declare Law Number 13 of 2019 not meeting the provisions of the formation of a law based on the 1945 Constitution and not legally binding. (Utami/NRA)

Translated by: Yuniar Widiastuti

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