Rules for selection of legislative candidates

Rules for selection of legislative candidates

Moch. N. Kurniawan, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The General Elections Commission (KPU) has drafted a guideline to
be used by political parties contesting the 2004 polls in
recruiting their legislative candidates.

The guideline, to be issued on Friday, says a legislative
candidate must, among other things, have a minimum of a high
school diploma or its equivalent, have no connection whatsoever
with the outlawed Indonesian Communist Party (PKI), not have been
convicted of jail sentence of more than five years in duration,
produce a clean bill of health, be registered as an eligible
voter and be a member of a political party.

The major requirements refer to the election law.

Specifically, the KPU will require that a copy of a high
school certificate must be authorized by relevant officials and
the legislative candidate must make a solemn declaration that he
or she was, "not involved in the aborted coup of 1965 or with the
PKI."

The draft decree states that each party's central board of
executives must inform the KPU of the nomination of their
candidates for the House of Representatives, while the
legislative candidates for the provincial or regency legislatures
will be reported by the party's chapters.

KPU and its offices in provinces and regencies/municipalities
will then carry out administrative and factual verification on
the candidates.

While administrative screening will be aimed at checking
required documents of the candidates, factual verification will
include an examination of the mechanism to select the legislative
candidates, including the 30 percent quota for female candidates
recommended by the election law.

KPU deputy chairman Ramlan Surbakti highlighted on Thursday
the article that allows KPU to check a party's internal mechanism
to select its legislative candidates.

He said under that according to the election law and the KPU
guidelines, legislative candidates should be nominated based on a
democratic and open selection mechanism.

However, there might be cases when a leading candidate is
placed below a little known candidate, thus sparking dispute
within the party or between the two candidates.

"In such a case, it seems logical for KPU and the Elections
Supervisory Committee (Panwaslu) to check whether or not the
candidates were selected based a democratic and open selection
process," he said.

He admitted that the KPU could be accused of intervening with
a party's internal affairs if it examined the party's selection
mechanism.

"So we need parties' feedback on whether we can intervene in
such a case, or the parties will resolve the case itself," he
told reporters.

Ramlan also said the 30 percent quota for women should be
clearly defined to accommodate the interest of women.

Separately, Togu Manurung of the Forest Watch Indonesia (FWI)
called on the KPU to make sure that the paper producers
participating in the ballot paper tender did not obtain their raw
materials from illegal logging.

Togu said that five bidders -- PT Indah Kiat, PT Surabaya
Agung, PT Adiprima Suraprinita, PT Kertas Leces and PT Kertas
Kraft Aceh -- had problems with the origin of their wood supply
as many have alleged that the supply comes from illegal logging
activities.