Opposing House factions cling to their positions
Opposing House factions cling to their positions
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The two opposing factions in the House of Representatives
remained locked in their respective positions on Friday, raising
the possibility of a lengthy deadlock in the legislative body.
Members of the Nationhood Coalition and the National Awakening
Party (PKB) proceeded with commission meetings on Friday, while
the People's Coalition issued a no-confidence motion against
House leaders, all of whom are from the Nationhood Coalition.
The Nationhood Coalition consists of Golkar, the Indonesian
Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), the Prosperous Peace Party
(PDS) and the Reform Star Party (PBR). The members of the
People's Coalition include the United Development Party (PPP),
National Mandate Party (PAN), Democratic Party, Prosperous Peace
Party (PKS) and several smaller parties grouped under the
Democratic Pioneer Reform faction.
"We have to start our work as legislators. That is our moral
responsibility," House Speaker Agung Laksono of Golkar said.
The House's defense commission and its honor council held
separate internal meetings on Friday to discuss their agendas.
Members of the commission and council seemed unfazed by claims
that plenary meetings attended by the Nationhood Coalition and
the PKB over the past few days were illegitimate and thus could
not produce legally binding decisions.
Members of the People's Coalition have boycotted all House
meetings since Tuesday, after their demand that commission
chairmanship posts be distributed proportionately was rejected by
the Nationhood Coalition, which wanted to put the posts to the
vote.
The proportional system would ensure that each faction --
including members of the People's Coalition, which supports the
administration of President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono -- would
receive chairmanship posts. Voting on the posts, on the other
hand, would lead to a dominance of the leadership positions by
Golkar and PDI-P, the two largest factions in the House.
With the People's Coalition boycotting the meetings, the
plenary sessions held on Wednesday and Thursday were attended by
five factions only, short of the six factions required by the
House's standing orders to make a plenary meeting legitimate.
The Nationhood Coalition and the PKB, however, agreed to amend
the standing orders on Thursday to make plenary meetings attended
by more than half of all legislators, regardless of the number of
factions represented, a quorum and thus able to take binding
decisions.
The PPP, meanwhile, said on Friday it had submitted a motion
of no-confidence against House leaders for violating the standing
orders on the formation of commissions and auxiliary bodies.
"The implication is that we will not attend meetings and
consider commission leaders elected by violating the standing
orders as illegitimate," PPP secretary-general Lukman Hakim was
quoted by Antara as saying.
Saying that all of the other members of the People's Coalition
were behind the PPP, Lukman also criticized the House leaders for
siding with the Nationhood Coalition rather than attempting to
bridge the differences between the two coalitions.
PAN faction chairman Abdillah Toha, meanwhile, urged the
government not to send ministers to hold hearings with the House
commissions until this controversy was resolved.
Non-governmental activists called on Friday on the
Constitutional Court to step in an settle the dispute in the
House to prevent the situation from deteriorating.
"It is not only illegitimate (the election of the commission
leaders), but the process is a violation of political ethics,"
said Bivitri Susanti of the Center for Indonesian Law and Policy
Studies.
Smita Notosusanto of the Center for Electoral Reform and
Firmansyah Arifin of the Consortium for National Law Reform
suggested that the Constitutional Court play a role in settling
the dispute.