Election law must promote accountability of legislators

Election law must promote accountability of legislators

Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Political and legal experts urged legislators on Tuesday to adopt
an electoral system that would promote accountability of the
future members of the House of Representatives (DPR).

The experts emphasized that the proposed revision to Law
No.3/1999 on elections should enable voters to elect trustworthy
representatives.

"Despite its weaknesses, the district electoral system can
promote the accountability of legislators," said Maswadi Rauf
from the University of Indonesia (UI) during a hearing with
members of the House special committee for election bill
deliberation.

"If the people's representatives are not accountable,
democracy will not flourish."

Maswadi, constitutional law experts Ismail Suny and Jimly
Ashidiqqie, and historian Hermawan Sulistyo, spoke to legislators
to give them input for their deliberations on the election bill.

Warning legislators of the consequences of an electoral system
has both strength and weakness.

He suggested that the House special committee focus more on
how to promote the accountability of legislators.

"Perhaps, a combination of a proportional system and an open-
list of candidates would be the best solution," Jimly added.

He said Indonesian voters had never really elected their
representatives in the legislative bodies.

In the past, voters were told only to elect symbols of
political parties and the executive board of the parties had the
authority to appoint members to become legislators.

Before addressing the special committee, Jimly criticized the
legislators for their tendency to ignore the thoughts of
academics.

He said that legislators often invited scholars for a hearing
and discussion. But the hearings were just a formality and the
ideas of scholars ignored.

Hermawan Sulistyo of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences
(LIPI) meanwhile said that although the amended 1945 Constitution
had adopted a bicameral parliamentary system, it would only
become a pseudo-bicameral system.

Hermawan, better known as Kiki, added the new system would
never become a strong bicameral system because the power of the
House of Representatives (DPR) and the Regional Representatives
Council (DPD) were not equal.

Under the draft election law, the new House will consist of
550 members while the Council will only be 120 members, four from
each of 30 provinces. "This will create conflict in the future,"
Hermawan added.

Meanwhile at an earlier meeting between minor political
parties and the special committee, leaders of minor parties urged
legislators to delay the implementation of the electoral
threshold until the election in 2009.

Should the ruling on electoral threshold be declared
effective, the minor parties will have to reach a coalition,
otherwise they will not be allowed to contest the election.

Chairman of the special committee Agustin Teras Narang said
that in the next few days his team would hear advice from
experts, political organizations and political parties to get
inputs for the revision.

Teras promised to finish the deliberations in November.

The General Elections Commission (KPU) has often said that it
requires time to prepare for a better election because the
commission has to educate members of election committee in
regional areas.

KPU also wanted legislators to quickly finish their
deliberations because the commission had to select which
political parties were eligible to contest the 2004 election.