Legislators demand more seats for Maluku

Moch. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Six legislators from Maluku complained on Tuesday about the loss of seats in the House of Representatives for the province, and urged the General Elections Commission (KPU) to abide by the newly passed elections law.

Freddy Latumahina of the Golkar Party insisted that Maluku, which was split into the provinces of Maluku and North Maluku in 2002, should receive six seats in the legislature in 2004, as stipulated in the elections law.

"We demand the KPU implement the elections law correctly and review the allocation of seats in the House. This review will avoid any new problems," he said during a hearing with the KPU on Tuesday.

Law No. 12/2003 on legislative elections stipulates that new provinces will receive three seats in the House in the 2004 elections, while established provinces will receive the same number of seats as they did in the 1999 elections.

However, while new provinces will get three legislative seats each, their parent provinces will receive the same number of seats as in 1999, minus three.

Maluku, for example, had six legislative seats in 1999 but will have only three in 2004, after giving up three seats to North Maluku. North Sulawesi, which in 1999 had seven seats, will receive only four in 2004 after losing three seats to the newly established Gorontalo province.

Parent provinces that have seen their populations increase, however, will get additional legislative seats in 2004.

The KPU has scheduled the legislative elections for April 5, 2004, with a total of 550 legislative seats up for grabs.

Fellow Maluku legislators Thahir Saimima, A.N. Radjawane, Frans Matruty, Aziz Pattisahusiwa and Alexander Litaay of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI Perjuangan) are also unhappy that Maluku will have three fewer seats in the legislature in 2004.

Alexander said the stipulations on legislative seats in the elections law was part of efforts to balance the distribution of seats between provinces in Java and those outside Java.

"The KPU should understand the background of the law. The KPU should also remember that Maluku was one of eight provinces that declared the country's independence in 1945. Therefore, reducing the number of our seats will insult the people of Maluku," he said.

Six political parties in Maluku filed a complaint with the KPU on Monday and vowed to boycott next year's elections if the commission did not review its seat allocation.

KPU officials Nazaruddin Sjamsuddin and Anas Purbaningrum have called on the legislators to remain calm over the matter.

Meanwhile, KPU member Mulyana W. Kusumah said the commission might delay the deadline for political parties to register for the 2004 elections from Oct. 9 to Oct. 19. He said moving back the deadline would be necessary if the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights is unable to complete the process of verifying political parties on schedule.

Mulyana said the later deadline would only apply to political parties verified in the third screening by the justice and human rights ministry.

However, he said that should the deadline be pushed back, political parties verified in the third screening by the ministry would have limited time to prepare their legislative candidates, as the KPU would announce those parties that qualified for next year's elections on Dec. 2.

The Ministry of Justice and Human Rights hopes to complete the verification of 66 parties in the third and last phase of party screening by Oct. 12 or Oct. 13.

So far, 18 parties have been verified by the ministry.