KPU to seek Court review in recall case
Moch. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
A regulation to allow political parties to arbitrarily replace elected representatives with an appointee of its choice at the provincial and regental legislatures remains in limbo as the General Elections Commission (KPU) has not yet verified the requirements for the replacement legislators.
KPU deputy chairman Ramlan Surbakti said on Thursday the commission would seek legal advice from the Supreme Court before responding to the parties' moves, in order to prevent future law suits from those who are dismissed.
"We will meet with the Supreme Court to get a legal opinion about the replacement mechanisms," Ramlan said. He did not set a specific date for the meeting.
Under the law on composition of legislative bodies which was passed in July this year, candidates who will replace legislative members in the House of Representatives and the provincial and regency legislatures are subject to screening by the KPU.
Ramlan said the KPU needed certainty of procedures to select eligible replacements, although he believes that the substitute must be next in line on the list of legislative candidates submitted to the KPU before the election.
A number of political parties have started withdrawing their non-conforming members at the provincial and regental legislative councils following the enforcement of the law on the composition of legislative bodies that revives the parties' power to replace legislative members.
Such an authority was adopted during the New Order regime which fell in 1998, but was then scrapped as part of the reform movement on the grounds that legislative members represented the people instead of political parties.
Separately, KPU member Mulyana W. Kusumah said that apart from the election law, the law on composition of legislative bodies needed revision.
"We are proposing that the House increase the number of seats at the House of Representatives from 550 to 560, which is against the law on composition of legislative bodies," he said.
The demands for such an amendment have increased over the past few weeks following requests from the some provinces whose territories had been split.
The KPU has decided that North Sulawesi, Maluku and Papua must share their seats with the new provinces of Gorontalo, North Maluku and West Irian Jaya respectively.
Therefore, the provincial seats of those areas at the House would decline. North Sulawesi is allotted six instead of seven, Maluku is to have three instead of six and Papua is allocated 10 seats.
In other election news, the Elections Supervisory Committee (Panwaslu) urged the KPU to halt the ongoing verification of regional representative candidates due to legal flaws.
Saut Sirait, Panwaslu deputy chairman, said KPU would announce the regional representatives candidates who qualify on Dec. 9, before the number of eligible voters is announced on Dec. 31.
"We know that on Dec. 9, we will not know the number of eligible voters who will determine the number of regional representative candidates. Therefore the verification must be canceled," he said.