House relaxes rule on proposal of bills

JAKARTA (JP): The House of Representatives ended its five-year sitting yesterday leaving what was probably the best legacy it could pass on to its successor: slightly less stringent requirements on initiating legislation.

It remains to be seen whether the new internal rule, passed at a plenary session yesterday, would be sufficient to allow the House to actually initiate a bill for once.

Under the new rule, a bill should be sponsored by at least 10 legislators from two different factions. It also says that a commission, or a joint commission, could initiate a bill.

The old rule, requiring a minimum of 20 sponsors from two factions, made it virtually impossible for members to bring up a bill for discussion at the House. All laws passed during the New Order era have been initiated by the government.

In the past, minority parties' plans to initiate a bill were thwarted by their inability to obtain support from the other political factions.

The new House will be installed by President Soeharto on Oct. 1.

All four factions in the House -- the dominant Golkar, the Armed Forces, the United Development Party (PPP) and the Indonesian Democratic Party (PDI) -- hailed the new ruling yesterday.

PDI faction spokesman Tyas Satijono said the greater flexibility in initiating bills meant that the next House should be able to accommodate more public interests.

"The new internal rule should help bring public aspirations on par with government interests in our legal system," Tyas said.

PPP faction spokesman Dja'far Siddiq said he looked forward to the time when the House would be able to initiate its own bills in the next five years.

Dja'far, however, kept his hopes realistic, saying that in the end, substance counted more than internal procedures.

"Whoever sponsors a bill must have reasonable arguments about its substance and urgency, and pass the test from fellow legislators, experts and the public," he said.

But at least, the new rule reflected the House's decision not to bind itself with procedural matters, he said.

Golkar agreed to relax the internal rule, but insisted that a bill must have the support of legislators from at least two different factions to be considered.

"A dictatorship by the majority will emerge if a single faction is allowed to exercise the right (to propose a bill)," Golkar spokesman Umbu Mehang Kunda said.

The new rule also says that only 10 members from two factions are required for the House to demand a government explanation of a certain policy, to make a statement of support or opposition to a policy and to propose an investigation.

Another major change in internal rules was the reduction of House commissions from 11 to eight to accommodate PDI's tiny team of 11 members in the next House.

The decision to change internal rules was prompted by the PDI debacle in the May general election. The party managed only to win a few seats in the House that would have prevented it from having enough representatives in all House commissions. (amd)