On Wednesday, Indonesia’s top court ruled that parties would not need a minimum 20% of representation in their regional assemblies in order to field a candidate.
…
If passed, it would maintain the status quo, which favours parties in the ruling coalition of the outgoing president
How?
… which favours parties in the ruling coalition … As a result, many local elections are expected to be uncontested affairs.
The current “status quo” is that the current ruler gets everything he wants.
I don’t see how removing the 20% requirement could mean this. Wouldn’t that be the opposite? Less restrictions meaning more competition?
There’s a bit of different powers at play.
Initially there’s the 20% threshold.
The MK (Makamah Konstitusi, or Constitution Court) wants to change that exactly to encourage healthier competition. They then published a ruling that embodies this.
The DPR (Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat, or House of Representatives) somehow thought they’re above the law, and decided they want to pass a bill that overturns this ruling.
At the same time, the current president wants to endorse his son to be the governor of Jakarta. In fact, this has been his ultimate goal, to make all his sons “follow his footsteps” to secure his power for generations to come.
However, it is written that one needs to be at least 30 years old to be nominated. He is just right below, at 29 years old. The people are using this to keep him from power, and MK agrees. DPR is trying to overturn that too.
Do note that previously, the current president had mendled with MK ruling using a friend on the inside to get his older son to be eligible for vice-presidency. He is now elected.
And that, my friend, is what the Indonesian people had enough of.
While having 20% representation would be trivial for the big parties, smaller parties would have to form coalitions in order to field a candidate — it’s easy to see how this results in much fewer candidates and w.r.t. the cronyism already rampant in parts of the Indonesian political landscape, it’s clear that quite a few people have gotten where they are through nepotism.
Getting rid of the 20% requirement would mean smaller parties being able to put forward their own candidates, giving much more choice instead of, for example, the usual big three which, for the average voter, comes down to picking the lesser evil.
The rapid response by the parliament has left a bad impression all a round because they only seem to ever react this fast when their interests are on the line as opposed to i.e. procrastinating passing the asset seizure bill (which has been pending since 2010 if I recall correctly), which would allow the state to seize assets from government officials convicted of corruption.
At least, this is what I gather hearing from friends and family at home.
edit: spelling
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