Work starts to change House rules
Work starts to change House rules
JAKARTA (JP): After weeks of heated polemics, legislators
began work yesterday on ways to change the House of
Representatives' internal rules.
The 500-strong House has set up a special team to come up with
a proposal on rule amendments by July 22.
The team consists of 21 legislators from the United
Development Party (PPP), Golkar, the Indonesian Democratic Party
(PDI) and the Armed Forces.
The House was forced to seek amendments to its rules after the
PDI won only 11 seats in the May 29 general election. Golkar won
325 seats and the PPP 89. The other 75 seats are reserved for the
Armed Forces, whose members do not vote.
Eleven seats is not enough for the PDI to field
representatives at all regular and special House sessions.
Representatives of all three parties and the Armed Forces are
needed for a quorum at any session.
The most touted suggestion to overcome this is to reduce the
number of House commissions from 11 to about five so the PDI can
be properly represented.
PDI chief Soerjadi, who has been under attack for his party's
humiliating defeat, supported the idea of reducing the number of
commissions.
Fundamentally, he said, the House's functions could be reduced
into three major categories: the state budget, law making and
supervision.
"So it's good to regroup the commissions based on these
categories," he said Wednesday.
The major weakness of having less commissions, he said, was
that each commission would have too many members and hearings
would be less effective.
But PPP chairman Ismail Hasan Metareum and former PPP chairman
and rival H.J. Naro have strongly opposed reducing the number of
commissions.
Metareum said extra legislators would make the commissions
ineffective, and each commission would be overworked.
He said the House internal rules had to be loosened to allow
each faction to use its many rights.
Critics say the House rules are so rigid that they stop
legislators exercising their rights. For example, a faction
cannot propose a bill without the support of at least two other
factions and 20 House members.
Naro said that less commissions would be less efficient.
"They will be over-worked and won't be able to do their best,"
he said.
Theoretically, he said, the commissions could be reduced to
four to oversee defense and diplomacy, economy and finance,
development and people's welfare.
Yahya Nasution, a senior PDI House member who has remained
loyal to ousted PDI leader Megawati Soekarnoputri, said that he
was totally opposed to reducing the number of commissions.
"On the contrary, new commissions should be created because in
the future, the House will have more issues to handle," he was
quoted by Antara as saying.
Each commission now has about 45 members from the three
parties and the Armed Forces.
Nasution said the problem was that only between 15 and 20 of
them actively participated in any session.
"If the House is to become effective, about four more
commissions should be created," he said.
The House has often been called a rubber stamp institution
because of its submissive attitude to the government.
Golkar secretary-general Ary Mardjono said in the East Nusa
Tenggara capital of Kupang yesterday that it was high time the
House rules be revised to make the legislative body more
effective.
He suggested that the House seek expert advise on how to
revise its rules. (05/pan)