Constitutional Court Rejects Judicial Review of Regional Election Law: Direct Elections Remain in Place
The Constitutional Court (MK) has dismissed a petition from students challenging the Regional Election Law. The court stated that, in fact, regional heads in Indonesia are currently elected by the people through direct elections, so there is no issue as raised by the petitioners. “The petitioners’ application is declared inadmissible,” the court ruled, as quoted from decision number 195/PUU-XXIV/2026, on Tuesday (30/6/2026).
The petition was filed by Vendy Setiawan and fellow students. In their application, the petitioners challenged Article 1, point 1 of Law Number 8 of 2015 concerning Regional Elections. The article states: “The election of Governor and Deputy Governor, Regent and Deputy Regent, as well as Mayor and Deputy Mayor, hereinafter referred to as Election, is the implementation of the people’s sovereignty in the province and regency/municipality to elect Governor and Deputy Governor, Regent and Deputy Regent, as well as Mayor and Deputy Mayor directly and democratically.”
In its considerations, the court noted that the petitioners challenged the article because they felt there was no affirmation that regional elections are conducted through direct voting by the people, thus opening the possibility for regional heads to be elected by the Regional People’s Representative Council (DPRD). The court referred to its considerations in previous rulings. According to the court, those rulings have affirmed that the mechanism for electing regional heads is currently carried out directly by the people, guided by generally applicable election principles while respecting special or autonomous regional government units.
On that basis, the court stated that the alleged constitutional harm suffered by the petitioners was not a direct result of the phrase ‘directly’ in Article 1, point 1 of the Regional Election Law. “Because, factually, the election of regional heads is still conducted directly by the people. Therefore, this legal fact proves that what the petitioners experienced, which they considered a specific constitutional harm, whether actual and/or potential, has actually not occurred or does not exist,” the court stated. The court also noted that the petitioners’ request for certain special or autonomous regions to have their own electoral arrangements was not yet a binding legal norm and had already been addressed in previous court rulings.