Chief Justice Anwar Usman reading out the verdict for the material judicial review of Law No. 7 of 2017 on General Elections, Thursday (7/7/2022). Photo by Humas MK/Ifa.

---

Thursday, July 7, 2022 | 19:26 WIB

JAKARTA, Public Relations—The Constitutional Court (MK) held another judicial review hearing of Article 173 paragraph (1) of Law No. 7 of 2017 on General Elections (Election Law) petitioned by the Just and Prosperous People's Party (Prima). The ruling hearing for Decision No. 57/PUU-XX/2022 took place on Thursday, July 7, 2022 in the plenary courtroom, presided over by Chief Justice Anwar Usman and the other eight constitutional justices.

When reading the Court’s legal considerations, Constitutional Justice Suhartoyo quoted the Court’s Decision No. 55/PUU-XVIII/2020 on 173 paragraph (1) of the Election Law: “‘A Political Party Contesting in an Election is a political party that has passed verification by the KPU’ is unconstitutional insofar as not interpreted as ‘A Political Party that has passed the verification for the 2019 Election and met the provision of Parliamentary Threshold in the 2019 Election must be verified administratively but not factually.’”

Meanwhile, parties that fail to meet the parliamentary threshold, that are only represented in the provincial/regency/city DPRD, and that are not represented in the provincial/regency/city DPRD, must go through both administrative and factual re-verifications. This also applies to new political parties.

“Because the substance the Petitioner challenged was the same as what the Court had ruled in Decision No. 55/PUU-XVIII/2020, although with different basis and reasoning, the essence requested in the a quo case is the same as that in a previous petition, i.e. the verification of political parties, both administrative and factual. Therefore, the legal considerations in Decision No. 55/PUU-XVIII/2020, mutatis mutandis, applies to the a quo petition. Based on those considerations, the Court declares the Petitioner’s petition legally groundless in its entirety,” Justice Suhartoyo read out.

Also read:

Just and Prosperous People's Party Challenges Provision on Party Verification

Just and Prosperous People's Party Affirms Constitutional Impairment

The Just and Prosperous People's Party (Prima) challenged Article 173 paragraph (1) of the Election Law. The preliminary hearing for case No. 57/PUU-XX/2022 took place on Tuesday, May 24, 2022.

Article 173 paragraph (1) of the Election Law reads, “A Political Party Contesting in an Election is a political party established as an election contestant following a verification process by the KPU.”

The Petitioner claimed that factual verification required of non-parliamentary political parties in order to meet the verification stage for the 2024 Election was unfair because the parties that had passed the parliamentary threshold in the 2019 Election were established and relatively superior in terms of structure, infrastructure, and finances than non-parliamentary ones such as the Just and Prosperous People's Party. Such a preferential treatment led to differing preparedness among parties. Therefore, the determination of factual verification of political parties is no longer relevant in guaranteeing the participation of political parties in elections as mandated by Article 22E paragraph (3) of the 1945 Constitution.

The Petitioner believed the rationale sufficient to compel the Court to review and improve Article 173 paragraph (1) of the Election Law by stating it unconstitutional as long as it is not interpreted as ‘A Political Party Contesting in an Election is a legal entity political party that has passed administration verification by the KPU.’

Writer        : Sri Pujianti
Editor        : Nur R.
PR            : Fitri Yuliana
Translator  : Yuniar Widiastuti (NL)

Translation uploaded on 7/11/2022 10:05 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.

---