Constitutional Justice Arief Hidayat reading out the Court’s legal considerations at the ruling hearing of the judicial review of Law No. 7 of 2017 on General Elections, Thursday (2/24/2022). Photo by Humas MK/Ifa.

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Thursday, February 24, 2022 | 15:00 WIB

JAKARTA, Public Relations—The Constitutional Court (MK) ruled the judicial review petition of Law No. 7 of 2017 on General Elections (Election Law) filed by Lieus Sungkharisma inadmissible. “[The Court] adjudicated, declares the petition inadmissible,” stressed plenary chairman Chief Justice Anwar Usman at the ruling hearing for case No. 5/PUU-XX/2022 on Thursday, February 24, 2022.

In its legal considerations, read out by Constitutional Justice Arief Hidayat, the Court argued that the Petitioner’s claim that political parties were merely means for presidential ticket candidates while the beneficiaries of the presidential election were citizens including the Petitioner was not a fundamental issue in the a quo petition.

“The provision of Article 1 paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution reads, ‘The sovereignty shall be in the hands of the people and implemented according to the Constitution.’ ‘The sovereignty shall be in the hands of the people’ means that the people have sovereignty, responsibilities, rights, and obligations to democratically elect leaders who will form a government to manage and serve all levels of society, as well as elect representatives of the people to oversee the running of the government,” Justice Arief explained.

Also read: Provision on Presidential Threshold Challenged Once Again

Justice Arief added that the sovereignty is implemented through the elections, which serve as a means for the people to elect leaders through a direct election of the president and vice president. Furthermore, the electoral system of Indonesian is an embodiment of the people’s sovereignty in order to produce a democratic state government based on Pancasila and the 1945 Constitution of the Republic of Indonesia. The election is democratic if every Indonesian citizen who has the right to vote can channel their choice directly, publicly, freely, confidentially, honestly, and fairly. Each voter can only exercise their right to vote once and all votes are equal in value (one person, one vote, one value). Meanwhile, election participants are political parties for the election of the House of Representatives (DPR) members, the provincial DPRD (Regional Legislative Council) members, and the regency/municipal DPRD members, individuals for the election of members of the Regional Representatives Council (DPDP, and candidate pairs endorsed by political parties or party coalitions for the presidential election.

Therefore, Justice Arief added, the alleged impairment that the Petitioner argued about was not related to the constitutionality of the a quo norm. Thus, the Court is of the opinion that the Petitioner did not have legal standing to file the a quo petition.

“Therefore, based on the abovementioned legal considerations, according to the Court, the Petitioner did not have the legal standing to file the a quo petition. Considering although the Court has the authority to hear the a quo petition, because the Petitioner did not have the legal standing to file the a quo petition, the Court did not consider the merit of the petition,” he stressed.

Also read: Petitioner Revises Petition on Provision on Presidential Threshold

The Petitioner argued that as an individual citizen he had the right to vote in the presidential elections. He also asserted that that Article 222 of the Election Law, which requires that the presidential candidate tickets are nominated by a political party (or a coalition thereof) that has won at least 20% of DPR (House of Representatives) seats or 25% of national valid votes, was in violation of Article 6 paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution.

He believes the presidential threshold does not meet those requirements as Article 6A paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution has regulated the requirements. The Petitioner believes that the article has, in a conceptual normative construction, declared the right to vote and right to be candidate as citizens’ constitutional rights. As such, he added, the unconstitutionality of Article 222 of the Election Law correlates with the violation of his constitutional right to have as many options of presidential candidate tickets in the 2024 election. Therefore, in the petitum, the Petitioner requested that the Court grant his petition and declare Article 222 of the Election Law unconstitutional and not legally binding.

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

Translation uploaded on 2/25/2022 11:14 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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