Each province to receive four seats in DPD
Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
All nine factions in the House of Representatives (DPR) have agreed that each province would have four representatives in the Regional Representatives Council (DPD), a legislative body mandated by the newly adopted for a bicameral system.
Legislators from nine factions and Home Affairs Minister Hari Sabarno reached the agreement in a meeting on Saturday night. The meeting was organized to speed up finalization of the much- awaited electoral bill.
DPD members, and DPR members will make up the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR), the highest legislative body.
The factions, however, were still debating whether the number of DPR members should be 550 or 600.
Several items in the bill, however, remained unsettled and would likely be put to a vote at a plenary meeting scheduled for Tuesday.
"There is a possibility that the unsolved items will be voted on at the plenary session," said Samuel Koto of the Reform faction on the sidelines of the meeting here on Sunday.
The House special committee deliberating the bill will have another hearing with Minister Hari Sabarno on Monday before the final meeting on Tuesday.
Among the unsolved items are the requirements for small political parties to qualify for the 2004 elections, the number of seats in the DPR, the restriction for state officials to actively campaign, voting procedures and the division of each constituency.
Golkar Party insists upon using each regency and mayoralty to as the constituencies, while other parties wanted it to be broken down by province or parts of the province.
"We have to ensure that all regencies have representation in the House," said Agun Gunandjar Sudarsa of Golkar.
But Effendi Choirie of the National Awakening Party (PKB) said that regencies would have enough representation with the establishment of the DPD, therefore, the constituency should not be delineated by regency but by province.
Legislators and the home minister emphasized that their agreement on the number of DPD members was chosen to fit with the amended Constitution which stipulates that the number of DPD members must not exceed one-third of the number of DPR members.
Article 22 (C) of the 1945 Constitution stipulates that members of DPD from each province are equal and the total number of DPD members should not exceed the number of DPR members.
Previously, the United Development Party (PPP) insisted that the number of representatives from each province should be five persons to ensure more representation.
"But we agree with the decision particularly to give room for representatives from new provinces should there be more formations of provinces," said PPP spokesman Chozin Chumaidy here on Sunday.
Despite the establishment of some new provinces, the meeting assumed that the number of provinces would stay at 30 for the time being. Given that assumption, the total number of DPD members would be 120. Since the number of DPR members will vary between 550 to 600, the number of DPD members will be below the limit.
Additional requirements for DPD candidates
Article 63: (a) Candidates must reside in the area they will represent for at least the last three years, or have resided in the province for a total of 10 years after their 17th birthday. (b) Candidates must not have been an executive member of any political party in the last four years.
Article 64: Candidates from the civil service, military or police force must resign those posts if elected to the DPD.