PKS President Ahmad Syaikhu and Secretary-General Habib Aboe Bakar Alhabsyi speaking at a press conference, Wednesday (7/6/2022) at Building I of the Constitutional Court. Photo by Humas MK/Bayu.

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Wednesday, July 6, 2022 | 15:26 WIB

JAKARTA, Public Relations—The Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) filed a material judicial review petition of Law No. 7 of 2017 on General Elections (Election Law) to the Constitutional Court (MK). PKS President Ahmad Syaikhu, Secretary-General Habib Aboe Bakar Alhabsyi, and advisory council chairman Salim Segaf Aljufri arrived at the Constitutional Court to file a petition on Wednesday afternoon, July 6, 2022. The Registrar’s Office recorded it in the petition filing certificate (AP3) No. 69/PUU/PAN.MK/AP3/07/2022.

The party challenges Article 222 of the Election Law, which reads, “A presidential candidate ticket shall be nominated by a political party (or a coalition thereof) contesting in an election that has managed to win at least 20% (twenty percent) of DPR seats or 25% (twenty-five percent) of national valid votes in the previous election of members of the DPR.”

The party argued that, from a moral standpoint, the open legal policy of presidential threshold at 20% of the House of Representatives (DPR) seats or 25% of the national valid votes did not benefit the public, since it narrowed down the alternative of presidential candidates. According to PKS, this actually created divisions or polarization in society, as it did in the last two elections.

At a press conference after filing the petition, Ahmad Syaikhu said the petition was filed after the party met with and heard the aspirations of the people who were against the provision. He also revealed three reasons why the party filed it.

First, many members of society wanted the provision changed. Second, the PKS intended to strengthen the democratic system by allowing more presidential tickets to contest in the future. Third, this would hopefully reduce the polarization in society because there were only two candidate pairs.

“The PKS’ legal team had reviewed no fewer than 30 judicial review petitions relating to presidential threshold ever filed to the Constitutional Court. The PKS follows the constitutional rationale of over 30 material judicial review petitions on Article 222 of the Election Law.

Presidential Threshold of 7-9%

One of the things Syaikhu highlighted was the Constitutional Court Decision No. 74/PUU-XVIII/2020, in which the Court stipulated that political parties of coalition thereof had legal standing to file the judicial review petition. “Moreover, based on our legal team’s study, there has not been any academic study of the 20% presidential threshold,” he added.

He asserted that his legal team recommended a threshold of 7-9%. “We outlined the basis for the calculation in the petition, which the PKS legal team will explain. Therefore, we appeal to the Constitutional Court to decide Article 222 of the Election Law conditionally unconstitutional.

Writer        : Utami Argawati
Editor        : Nur R.
Translator  : Yuniar Widiastuti (NL)

Translation uploaded on 7/7/2022 14:35 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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