Electoral district to have between six to 12 seats
Kurniawan Hari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The General Elections Commission (KPU) decided on Tuesday that an electoral district for the regional legislative councils (DPRDs) in regencies and provinces would have on average six to 12 seats.
KPU deputy chairman Ramlan Surbakti told reporters the districting decision would be applied in a flexible manner, given the fact that the country's population was not evenly distributed.
In a less populated area, each seat would represent 325,000 people while in a densely populated area one seat would represent 425,000 people, Ramlan said.
Based on this, some administrative areas would have to merge to form an electoral district to meet the minimum requirements of the population of 1,950,000.
Ramlan acknowledged that the new system would certainly spark confusion among people as not all of the district administrations would have representatives in the legislature.
"This will be the duty of KPU to explain to people at the grassroots level that an electoral district does not represent an administrative entity," Ramlan said after a KPU meeting.
In the past, an electoral district was associated with an administrative entity of regency or district.
The elections law stipulates that each electoral district will have an allocation of between three and 12 seats, with an electoral district covering a regency or a district or a merger of regencies or districts.
Deputy director of the Center for Electoral Reform (CETRO) Hadar N. Gumay hailed the KPU decision, saying it would improve the quality of representation of the elected legislative members.
Hadar suggested that if possible the allocation of seats be pushed to 12 seats for every electoral district.
"The more the number of seats in every electoral district, the bigger the opportunity for people's representation and in particular women's representation," Hadar told The Jakarta Post.
He added that the decision would also give more room to small or newly-formed political parties to contest seats at regional level.
Ramlan said the districting decision would also reduce the number of electoral districts compared to that in the past, therefore lightening the work of the KPU, especially in the distribution of ballot papers.
He said the KPU had decided not to strictly follow the elections law regarding the districting for fear that it would spark problems in the field.
The KPU had earlier categorized electoral districts into three groups: Small electoral districts that will have between three to five seats, middle electoral districts with six to eight seats, and big electoral districts with nine to 12 seats.
The KPU will regroup on Wednesday to decide on electoral districts in the election of House of Representatives legislators.