Democrats and PKS Reject Proposal for DPRD Parliamentary Threshold
Two political parties holding seats in the DPR have rejected the proposal to apply a parliamentary threshold to regional legislative elections. The two parties in question are the Democratic Party and PKS.
General Secretary of the Democratic Party, Herman Khaeron, stated that the threshold, intended as an effort to simplify the party system, is already sufficiently applied at the DPRD level.
“For the DPRD, a zero percent threshold is already quite appropriate,” said Herman when contacted on Wednesday, 6 May 2026.
According to him, the absence of a threshold in the DPRD so far has been a form of providing space for individual representation on behalf of their party due to their election in a smaller electoral district scope.
Instead, he continued, applying a threshold in the DPRD would widen the risk of valid votes not being converted into parliamentary seats. “So, in our view, the current policy in the DPRD does not need to be changed,” Herman stated.
In agreement with Herman, Mardani Ali Sera, a member of Commission II of the DPR from the PKS Faction, said that applying a threshold in the DPRD would indeed create simplification of the party system as it applies in the DPR currently.
“However, this has the potential to eliminate diversity of political parties in the regions,” said Mardani.
Previously, the proposal to apply a threshold down to the DPRD level was put forward by Deputy General Chairman of the Golkar Party, Ahmad Doli Kurnia Tandjung. He assessed that a threshold for DPRD could be applied in stages or smaller than the threshold applied for DPR elections.
“For example, 5 percent for the DPR. Well, for provincial DPRD it could be 4 percent, and for regency/city it could be 3 percent,” said Doli when contacted on Tuesday, 22 April 2026.
Similarly to Doli, Chairman of Commission II of the DPR, Muhammad Rifqinizamy Karyasuda, also proposed applying a threshold for DPRD. The reason is that this policy is considered important to create effective governance.
“We propose that the threshold applies not only at the national level, but also at the provincial and regency/city levels,” said the NasDem politician on Thursday, 24 April 2026.
The Constitutional Court Decision Number 52/PUU-X/2012, among others, annulled the provisions of Articles 208 and 209 of Law Number 8 of 2012 concerning Elections for Members of the DPR, DPD, and DPRD, particularly regarding the threshold for determining the allocation of DPRD Type I and II member seats.
Before being annulled, those articles contained rules for a threshold of 3.5 percent of the national valid votes from a party to be included in the determination of seat allocation for DPR and DPRD members.