Lots Of Discourse On Postponing The 2024 Election, Perludem: Violation Of The Principles Of People's Sovereignty

JAKARTA - The discourse of postponing the 2024 General Election (Pemilu) has become a hot topic of discussion lately. There are pros and cons.

A number of parties oppose this discourse because it is considered to be detrimental to democracy in Indonesia. Member of the Board of Trustees of the Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem), Titi Anggraini emphasized that the attempt to postpone the 2024 General Election (Pemilu) is a violation of the principle of people's sovereignty.

Titi said that people's sovereignty is one of the principles on which the constitution is formed. So according to her, the violation of this principle also violates the state constitution of the 1945 Constitution.

"We have practiced the principle of popular sovereignty through holding free and fair elections," Titi said while speaking at a virtual discussion event that was attended in Jakarta, as reported by Antara, Sunday, March 6.

She also questioned the reason for the postponement of the 2024 election, namely for economic stability. According to her, this is an unusual, illogical, and without precedent reason and is an attempt to weaken the principle of people's sovereignty.

"(Delayed elections) make people's sovereignty cannot be applied," explained Titi.

She conveyed that the postponement of the 2024 election also violated the obligation to hold general elections periodically or periodically, as ordered by constitutional rules.

“In Article 22E paragraph 1, it is stated that general elections are held in an honest and transparent manner (direct, general, free, secret, honest and fair) every 5 years. The obligation to hold elections on a regular basis is clearly violated by this narrative of postponing elections," she said.

Finally, Titi conveyed that the effort to postpone the 2024 General Election was an excuse to bypass or violate the term limits stipulated in the 1945 Constitution.

“The constitution can indeed be replaced, it can be amended. However, the spirit of democratic constitutionalism is our state's commitment,” explained Titi.

She reminded the political elite that the state constitution of the 1945 Constitution is not just articles that can be changed as needed. According to her, the articles are a joint commitment to limit the government's power.

The government's power, she added, could only be limited through holding periodic general elections and limiting the term of office of the president.

In the same discussion, Titi said that several political elites had tried to bring up the discourse on postponing the election since mid-2021. However, that effort was later dimmed because the discourse was not very well received by the public.