JAKARTA - The issue of the parliamentary threshold or Parliamentary Threshold (PT) is heating up again. The Labor Party together with the People's Voice Sovereignty Movement (GKSR) expressed a strong rejection of the discourse to increase the PT figure above 4%.
The President of the Labor Party, Said Iqbal, emphasized that the policy has the potential to remove tens of millions of legitimate people's votes, including votes from the labor community. Based on Labor Party data, in the 2024 election alone, the number of votes wasted reached more than 60.6 million votes due to the PT 4% rule.
"What kind of democracy do we want to build if tens of millions of voters are always wasted in every election due to the 4% PT rule," said Said Iqbal in his official statement.
Main Reasons for Rejection
Said Iqbal highlighted three crucial factors why the current parliamentary threshold rule must be revised, not tightened:
Contrary to the Constitutional Court's Decision Based on the Constitutional Court's Decision Number 116/PUU-XXI/2023, the law-makers are required to change the amount of PT so that it does not conflict with the sovereignty of the people. According to Said, the spirit of the decision is to lower the PT figure, not raise it."If the PT figure is raised above 4%, it violates morality and rationality. The Labor Party is determined to sue the rule to the Constitutional Court," he said.
Massive Waste of Sah Votes The facts on the ground show that PT 4% alone has thrown away 57.1 million votes in the 2019 Election and jumped to 60.6 million in the 2024 Election. This means that on average more than 40% of the people's votes are not converted into seats in parliament. Unfair Calculation Method Said Iqbal criticized the PT's calculation based on national votes. Referring to various MK rulings (such as No. 137/PUU-XXII/2024), the election rules should be based on the Electoral District (Dapil).Three Democratic Solutions
As an alternative, the Labor Party and GKSR formulated three options to create a fairer election system:
Option 1: If the PT still exists, the calculation basis must refer to the vote acquisition in each Dapil, not the national accumulation. Option 2: If you still use the national basis, the threshold figure must be lowered to 1%. Option 3: Remove the PT rule and replace it with a system of dividing fractions in the DPR (Government Support Faction and Counterweight Faction).This step was taken to ensure that every voice of the people, especially the 20 million votes of workers, still has a value of representation at the national level.
The English, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, and French versions are automatically generated by the AI. So there may still be inaccuracies in translating, please always see Indonesian as our main language. (system supported by DigitalSiber.id)
