Dissenting Opinion Judge Of The Constitutional Court, Saldi Isra: Government Program Can Be A Camiflase Support For Presidential And Vice Presidential Candidates

The panel of judges at the Constitutional Court (left to right) Saldi Isra, Suhartoyo and Arief Hidayat in the 2024 presidential election dispute trial at the Constitutional Court. (Between)

JAKARTA - The Constitutional Court (MK) rejected Anies Baswedan-Muhaimin Iskandar's request in the trial of the 2024 presidential election dispute decision. However, there was a dissenting opinion or different opinion of the judge in the decision.

One of them is the judge of the Constitutional Court, Saldi Isra. In his opinion, Saldi highlighted the issue of social assistance funds that the applicant considered a tool to win Prabowo Subianto-Gibran Rakabuming Raka.

President Jokowi, according to Saldi, did have the opportunity to campaign for supported presidential and vice presidential candidates.

However, Saldi emphasized that this support should be in his personal capacity and not as a government power holder who still has to complete his government programs. "At this point, it becomes difficult to assess the actions of a president before and during the election," said Saldi while reading the dissenting opinion in the Court courtroom, Tuesday, April 22.

In this case, Saldi said that the person who holds the highest position in the ranks of government can argue that the acceleration of his program is in order to complete the government program whose term of office will expire.

"However, the program in question can also be used as camouflage and is used as a tool to support the pairs of candidates participating in the presidential and vice presidential elections," he explained.

It is known that the Constitutional Court rejected Anies-Muhaimin's request. Originally, Anies-Cak Imin's camp submitted a request for the Constitutional Court to disqualify Gibran Rakabuming Raka on the grounds of a violation.

In addition, the presidential and vice-presidential candidates number 1 also suspect that there was a violation behind the distribution of social assistance, as well as President Joko Widodo (Jokowi).

However, the Court considered that the arguments submitted by the applicant were not based on law.

"Reject the applicant's application in its entirety," said Chief Justice of the Constitutional Court Suhartoyo when reading the verdict.