In Front Of PKB And Gerindra, PKS Invites Other Parties To Sue Threshold For Presidential Candidates Of 20 Percent

20th Anniversary of PKS at Istora Senayan, Jakarta, Sunday 29 May. (VOI/Diah)

JAKARTA - PKS President Ahmad Syaikhu invites other parties to file a lawsuit for judicial review of Law (UU) Number 7 of 2017 concerning Elections related to the presidential threshold or the threshold for presidential candidacy.

In the Election Law, the threshold for presidential candidacy is set at a minimum of 20 percent of parliamentary seats obtained by political parties or a combination of political parties in the previous election.

Syaikhu realized that the acquisition of PKS seats in the 2019 election which was only 8.21 percent could not make his party carry presidential and vice presidential candidates alone because it was hampered by the presidential threshold requirements.

"The presidential threshold is still high at 20 percent, so there are many obstacles. There is no political party that can freely advance its cadres to be able to appear as national leaders," said Syaikhu at the PKS 20th Milad event at Istora Senayan, Jakarta , Sunday, May 29.

Therefore, in front of political figures representing other parties who were present at this milad event, Syaikhu invited him to try to lower the threshold for presidential candidacy by filing a judicial review lawsuit to the Constitutional Court.

"It is appropriate, as elements of a political party, we are grateful in this era of collaboration that today we can conduct a judicial review of this 20 percent threshold presidential provision. So, then it can be lowered, more easily, and there is no polarization in the process. future politics," said Syaikhu.

Since a long time ago, PKS has several times expressed its disapproval of the 20 percent presidential threshold. Previously, the Deputy Chair of the MPR from the PKS faction, Hidayat Nur Wahid (HNW) viewed that the presidential candidate threshold of 20, which had been in effect since the 2014 and 2019 presidential elections, had many negative impacts.

"With such a large PT, the available presidential candidates are increasingly limited, and it is proven that in the 2014 and 2019 presidential elections, only two pairs of candidates who meet the requirements can run in the presidential election," said HNW some time ago.

HNW said, the impact of only having two candidates seemed to make the people feel as if they were forced to choose a limited number of candidates.

According to him, many public figures are hampered by the presidential threshold, so they cannot advance in the political contestation.

Another bad impact, according to him, is that there is polarization among the people due to the fact that there are only two candidates in the 2014 and 2019 presidential elections. Each of the supporters of the presidential candidate becomes hostile to each other.

"A serious problem that has a long-term impact with only 2 candidates running as presidential/vice presidential candidates is the division in society from the household level to the state scale," he explained.

The 20th anniversary of PKS took place at Istora Senayan, Jakarta, today. In the event, the party bearing the rice and crescent logo invited political figures and politicians from different parties.

Those who attended the event were the Governor of DKI Jakarta Anies Baswedan, the General Chairperson of the PKB Muhaimin Iskandar alias Cak Imin, to the Deputy Chair of the Gerindra Board of Trustees Sandiaga Uno.