Another Proposal for Parliamentary Threshold, This Time from Yusril

Proposals regarding the parliamentary threshold have resurfaced. The latest comes from Coordinating Minister for Law, Human Rights, Immigration, and Corrections Yusril Ihza Mahendra, who suggests using the number of commissions in the DPR RI as the benchmark for the parliamentary threshold for political parties participating in legislative elections to enter parliament and form factions. “For example, the benchmark could be the actual number of commissions in the DPR. This is currently regulated in the standing orders, but it should be regulated in the law,” Yusril said in Cawang, East Jakarta, on Wednesday (29/4/2026). Under this scheme, according to Yusril, each party must secure at least 13 seats in the DPR RI. Yusril also suggested that participating parties failing to reach 13 seats still have options. According to him, such parties could form joint coalitions totalling at least 13 seats or join the faction of a larger party. “This way, no votes are lost, and it is fair for all of us,” Yusril stated. He assessed that additional rules are needed to ensure people’s voices remain accommodated. This is because the electoral system has been agreed upon as proportional, where the distribution of party seats in parliament is determined by the percentage of votes obtained. Therefore, he urged revisions to the Law on the MPR, DPR, DPD, and DPRD (MD3) in the hope that it would serve as the basis for determining the agreed parliamentary threshold. “And I hope this will emerge as a middle-ground solution to address the issue of the minimum threshold, how we determine its number, and how we then form factions in the DPR,” he said.