Members of Parliament with Pure Voice Are Not Proposed to be PAW

JAKARTA - Unas political observer, Andi Yusran, assessed that the proposal to increase the parliamentary threshold (PT) risked increasing the number of lost votes and directly impacting the level of public political representation in parliament.

Therefore, he proposed a number of ideas to be considered in the discussion of the Election Bill. First, PT should be lowered below 4 percent to minimize wasted votes and maintain the principle of proportionality in the electoral system. Second, the procedure for calculating party votes nationally needs to be changed.

"The calculation is not only based on the number of votes for the DPR seat, but also accommodates the number of votes at the provincial and district/city levels. Thus, the real support of the community at various levels still has weight in the representation system," Andi said in a statement, Sunday, March 1.

Third, factions are no longer used as a means of completing the council. This step is considered important to reduce the cooptation of council members by the executive through the faction channel. With the strengthening of the position of individual legislators, each member of the council is expected to be more independent and truly represent the people.

Fourth, Andi Yusran emphasized that members of the council who were elected through pure votes must have the full right to remain in office for five years, even if they were fired by their party. He also encouraged council members to have the freedom to switch parties without losing their seats.

"In fact, the people choose their representatives to serve for five years. However, this trust is often amputated by the party," he said.

Andi hopes that the discussion of the Election Bill in the future will really be oriented towards strengthening the sovereignty of the people and improving the quality of substantive democracy, not just benefiting the interests of political parties alone.