PKS's Lawsuit Regarding The Presidential Threshold Against The Constitutional Court, Suhartoyo And Saldi Isra Asking Opinion

Photo by total Tingey on Unsplash

JAKARTA - The Constitutional Court rejected the lawsuit for testing Law Number 7 of 2017 concerning General Elections regarding the 20 percent presidential threshold proposed by the Prosperous Justice Party.

"Reject the petitioners' petition in its entirety," said Chief Justice of the Constitutional Court Anwar Usman when reading the verdict of Case Number 73/PUU-XX/2022 in Jakarta, Thursday, September 29, as reported by Antara.

The test of the Election Law was submitted by PKS represented by General Chair Ahmad Syaikhu and Secretary General Aboe Bakar Alhabsyi as applicants I and Chairman of the PKS Syura Council Salim Segaf Aljufri as applicant II.

In this case, two judges from the Constitutional Court, namely Suhartoyo and Saldi Isra, have different reasons (concurring opinions).

Suhartoyo is of the opinion that he will remain in his position as previously stated, that regarding the threshold for presidential candidacy, there is an inappropriate percentage.

Previously, in its main petition, PKS asked for the threshold for presidential candidacy to be lowered from 20 percent to seven to nine percent.

Responding to the request, Constitutional Justice Enny Nurbaningsih said the Constitutional Court remained in its stance on the provisions of Article 222 of Law Number 7 of 2017 which stipulates the threshold for presidential and vice presidential candidacy by political parties and coalition political parties.

The establishment of the Constitutional Court, he continued, was to assess that this was an open political policy.

"According to the Constitutional Court, this is not the realm of the Constitutional Court's authority to assess and then change the amount of the threshold. This is also emphasized by the applicants in their application, the video application for page 26 is an open policy so that it becomes the authority of the legislators, namely the DPR with the president to further determine the need for legislation regarding the amount of the threshold," explained Enny.