KPU issues guidelines for recruiting legislative candidates

KPU issues guidelines for recruiting legislative candidates

Tiarma Siboro and Muninggar Sri Saraswati, The Jakarta Post,
Jakarta

The General Elections Commission (KPU) has issued guidelines on
recruiting legislative candidates for political parties
participating in the 2004 elections.

KPU chairman Nazaruddin Syamsuddin said on Thursday that the
guidelines aimed at netting qualified individuals through a
democratic and transparent process.

"These are a very important guidelines for political parties
as they must screen their legislative candidates through a
democratic and transparent process," Nazaruddin said.

According to the guidelines, the maximum number of legislative
candidates a political party may propose is 120 percent of the
seats contested. Each party is also urged to allocate 30 percent
of its legislative seats to female candidates as suggested in the
Election Law.

It also stipulates that a legislative candidate must, among
other things, be an Indonesian citizen of at least 21 years of
age and reside in Indonesia, be able to speak, read and write in
Indonesia and possess at least a high school diploma or its
equivalent.

"The requirements to speak, read and write in Indonesian are
not made to limit the political rights of disabled citizens who
have the capability to carry out the tasks of a legislator," the
guidelines state.

A candidate must not be linked whatsoever to the outlawed
Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), must have no criminal
conviction of more than five years, and must produce a clean bill
of health, be an eligible voter and a member of political party.

A number of election watchdogs, however, criticized the KPU on
Thursday for not defining "democratic and transparent process"
clearly.

Smita Nososusanto from the Center for Electoral Reform (Cetro)
suggested that the KPU give parties more time to select their
legislative candidates to allow public participation in the
selection process.

"The new regulation makes the selection process of legislative
candidates prone to money politics as parties will only propose
candidates who are able to buy votes," she told a press
conference on Thursday.

In a bid to prevent vote-buying during the selection of
legislative candidates, some watchdogs have established a network
to collect data on the track records of each politician.

Teten Masduki, who leads the Indonesian Corruption Watch
(ICW), said on Thursday that the network had already set up
offices in eight regions.

The eight regions are Padang in West Sumatra, Bandung in West
Java, Kupang in East Nusa Tenggara, Mataram in West Nusa
Tenggara, Lampung, Samarinda in East Kalimantan, Pontianak in
West Kalimantan and Makassar in South Sulawesi.

"They (the watchdogs) must not hesitate to tell the public
about violations committed by legislative aspirants, including
corruption charges, domestic violence or sexual harassment and
rights abuses," Teten said.

Separately, National Resilience Institute (Lemhannas) governor
Ermaya Suradinata said that stability in the country would be
critical ahead of the 2004 elections, and that the elections
might not eventuate if people remained unaware of the critical
situation.

He named six problems the country would face ahead of the
elections: the nation's political culture, which tends to put
personal interests above national interests; the lack of
political communication among the elite; poor performance of the
political elite, making it difficult for people to identify
qualified figures; the increasing number of apathetic people;
worsening security across the country, especially in the Central
Sulawesi town of Poso, as well as in Papua and Aceh; and the poor
performance of legal enforcers, especially in dealing with cases
thought to have a political connection.

"Therefore, I suggest the political elite set a forum to share
ideas over the aim of this nation," Ermaya said.