Garuda Party Finds It Odd If a Political Party Fails to Enter the DPR in 2029, Yet the Presidential Candidate It Nominates Wins

JAKARTA — Deputy General Chairman Teddy Gusnaidi of Partai Garuda said that, based on a decision by the Constitutional Court (MK), all political parties taking part in the 2029 elections can nominate a President and Vice-President, without needing to form coalitions with other parties.

Therefore, Teddy argues that the parliamentary threshold should be automatically removed because it no longer holds any binding effect.

“Based on the MK decision, the Presidential Threshold is removed, so political parties participating in the elections can nominate Presidents and Vice Presidents in the 2029 presidential election. There is no other condition in the MK decision, except that they must pass as a political party participating in the elections,” Teddy told Kompas.com on Thursday (5/3/2026).

Teddy said that, according to the MK, the presidential and legislative elections must be held simultaneously, so it is already known which parties have qualified as election participants.

According to him, if the parliamentary threshold remains, there will be election-participating political parties whose presidential-cair (pair) wins, but they themselves do not pass into the DPR.

Therefore, Teddy finds it odd if a presidential candidate wins, but the party that nominated them fails to enter parliament due to the parliamentary threshold.

“Or, the presidential candidate remains legitimate, but the party that participated in the elections and nominated them is not in parliament. Is that not odd? A party that single-handedly fields a winning presidential and vice-presidential candidate but is not in parliament?” he added.

Discussions of changing the parliamentary threshold have resurfaced along with DPR plans to revise the Election Law. However, the effort to lower the figure is not easy because it involves the interests of the big parties in the parliament.

“If now this is to be discussed again, perhaps it could be reduced; the fight with the DPR is not easy. Because the DPR is controlled by parties that also want to secure a spillover from wasted votes, you see. They want that as well,” Mahfud said at the Parliamentary Threshold Seminar, Wednesday (4/3/2026).

According to Mahfud, seats that should be spread to smaller parties end up being distributed to parties that pass the threshold.

This condition causes the big parties to have an interest in maintaining a high threshold.