Following Threshold Debates, Discourse on Separating Legislative and Presidential Elections Emerges in DPR

A member of Commission II of the DPR, Ahmad Doli Kurnlaria, has reopened the discourse on changing the election design ahead of the planned discussion of the Election Bill in his commission in the near future.

The Deputy Chairman of the Golkar Party proposed that legislative elections (Pileg) and presidential elections (Pilpres) should be held separately again, after being held simultaneously in recent elections.

“From the beginning, we have proposed that the three types of elections we have—legislative, presidential, and regional elections (Pilkada)—should be held separately, without being combined,” Doli stated in a briefing on Tuesday (22/9).

Doli revealed three reasons: first, to prevent the fragmentation of public concentration at the ballot box for the presidential, legislative, and regional elections.

According to him, simultaneous elections have caused the public to lose focus on the figures they are choosing, due to the overwhelming amount of ballot papers and campaign materials they receive.

“We want the public to be able to follow each type of election with focus on each specific type of election,” he said.

Secondly, Doli argued that simultaneous elections, particularly presidential ones, lose legitimacy because they rely on the legislative vote thresholds from five years prior. He noted that such a time span allows for shifts in party stances regarding their presidential candidates.

“This ultimately results in a lack of relevance between the aspirations of support for political parties and the president-vice president candidates at the time the election is held,” said Doli.

Thirdly, the separation of legislative and presidential elections is believed to lighten the burden on election organisers.

Several issues surrounding the Election Bill are now emerging and becoming topics of discussion across various factions in the DPR. Previously, options regarding thresholds also surfaced, including the removal of the presidential threshold and a proposal to raise the parliamentary threshold to 5 per cent.