The panel of constitutional justices entering the courtroom to review the petition against Law No. 7 of 2017 on General Elections, Tuesday (2/22/2022). Photo by Humas MK/Ilham W. M.

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Tuesday, February 22, 2022 | 15:13 WIB

JAKARTA, Public Relations—The Constitutional Court (MK) held another judicial review hearing of Law No. 7 of 2017 on General Elections (Election Law) on Tuesday, February 22, 2022 in the panel courtroom. the case No. 11/PUU-XX/2022 was filed by the Ummah Party, represented by Chairman Ridho Rahmadi and the Secretary-General of the party’s DPP (central executive board) A. Muhajir.

At the hearing, legal counsel Muhamad Raziv Barokah conveyed the revisions to the petition following the recommendations of the justice panel during the preliminary hearing. The Petitioner, he said, revised the Petitioner’s legal standing and points 3-4 on page 6 by adding a quote on the Constitutional Court.

Also read: Presidential Endorsement Hindered, Ummah Party Challenges Presidential Threshold

At the preliminary hearing, the Petitioner argued that Article 222 of the Election Law is not an open legal policy and is in violation of Article 6 paragraph (2) and Article 6A paragraph (5) of the 1945 Constitution. According to the Petitioners, Article 6A paragraph (5) of the 1945 Constitution concerns technical matters, while the 20% presidential threshold does not concern technical matters and actually hinders fair and competitive democracy. Meanwhile, endorsement should have been regulated in a limited manner in Article 6 paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution. Therefore, Article 222 of the Election Law is actually a closed legal policy and, thus, should be annulled.

The Petitioner also asserted that the presidential threshold also eliminates the Petitioner’s constitutional right as a political party to endorse presidential candidates, besides discriminating against small political parties and contradicting Article 6 paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution. “Due to Article 222, which adds the phrase ‘20% of the DPR seats or 25% of the national valid votes,’ the pure constitutional rights granted by Article 6 paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution are lost and is, of course, detrimental to the Petitioner,” he stressed before the panel chaired by Deputy Chief Justice Aswanto.

The Petitioner argued that the implementation of the presidential threshold potentially bars a run-off, which is regulated in Article 6A paragraphs (3) and (4) of the 1945 Constitution. This is proven in the 2014 and 2019 presidential elections, which only presented two presidential candidates—Joko Widodo and Prabowo Subianto. Thus, in their petition, the Petitioner requested that the Court declare Article 222 of the Election Law unconstitutional and not legally binding.

Writer        : Utami Argawati
Editor        : Lulu Anjarsari P.
PR            : Raisa Ayuditha
Translator  : Yuniar Widiastuti (NL)

Translation uploaded on 2/22/2022 18:25 WIB

Disclaimer: The original version of the news is in Indonesian. In case of any differences between the English and the Indonesian versions, the Indonesian version will prevail.

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