JAKARTA Deputy Chairperson of the Golkar Party Bambang Soesatyo and also member of the DPR RI said that the proposed amendment to the mechanism for the election of the vice president in the Indonesian constitutional system proposed by the former Chief Justice of the Constitutional Court Prof. Jimly Asshiddiqie deserves consideration. The idea put forward is to maintain the Presidential election directly by the people, but open space for the Vice President to be elected and determined by the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR), based on one or two names submitted directly by the President-elected to the MPR.
This idea is increasingly relevant to new provisions eliminating presidential candidacy threshold requirements of 20%. Opens up more than 3 presidential candidates, reducing the obligation to form a coalition of political parties before elections that tend to be transactional.
"Amid the demands of more substantial democratization and the need for strong government stability, the separation of the mechanism for the election of the President and Vice President can be a solution to a number of systemic problems in our electoral democratic practices. One of them is the pressure of political compromise in the process of nominating pairs of presidential and vice presidential candidates who often cause distortion of the direction of national leadership," said Bamsoet in his response while attending the launch of the book 'Indonesian State Apparatus System after the Change of the 1945 Constitution' at the Kompas Jakarta Office, Friday, July 4.
Present were among others the authors of the book/Secretary General of the Indonesian National Student Movement Alumni Association (PA GMNI) Abdy Yuhana, 6th Vice President of the Republic of Indonesia Try Sutrisno, Constitutional Court Judge Arief Hidayat, Sukidi Nationality Thinker, Chairman of the DPP PA Ideology Council GMNI Guntur Soekarnoputra and Former Indonesian Housing Minister Siswono Yudo Husodo and Daily Editor-in-Chief Kompas Haryo Damardono.
The 15th chairman of the MPR RI and the Chairperson of the 20th DPR RI explained, through the proposed new scheme, the presidential candidate will continue to run through direct elections, but he does not have to be bound earlier with the Vice President candidate in one pair package. After being elected, the President is given room to propose one or two names of Vice Presidential candidates to the MPR. Furthermore, the MPR will select and appoint a new Vice President based on the approval of the majority of MPR members.
"This step is believed to be able to restore the strategic position of the MPR in the constitutional system which has tended to be marginalized after the amendments. The MPR's involvement in determining the Vice President provides additional political legitimacy, making the Vice President a figure who has a broad political network and is able to bridge the various strengths that exist in parliament," said Bamsoet.
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The chairman of Commission III of the 7th DPR RI and the Deputy Chairperson of the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry explained that this election model also encourages the formation of a more functional and effective cabinet. If previously the coalition of parties had to be formed before the election for the sake of nomination, this system would allow the coalition to be formed after the election within the framework of cabinet formation. This means that there is no longer a need to build a premature coalition of parties that is prone to power transactions. The coalition is sufficient to form once, within the framework of building a strong and stable government.
In this model too, the Vice President did not experience a constitutional decline. Even though he was elected by the MPR, his status remains as deputy head of state and government, with a complete role and function in accompanying the President.
"This change must of course go through a formal mechanism for constitutional amendments. Technically, a number of verses in Article 6A need to be changed, especially paragraphs (1) to (5) which have been the legal basis for the direct election of the presidential-vice presidential pairs. The abolition of the term pairs of candidates will be followed by strengthening the new article, namely Article 6B which provides a legal basis for the President to submit a candidate for Vice President to the MPR," concluded Bamsoet.
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