Govt Respects Court's Ruling on Presidential Nomination Threshold

KBRN, Jakarta: The government respected the Constitutional Court's ruling that abolished the presidential nomination threshold, Coordinating Law, Human Rights, Immigration and Corrections Minister Yusril Ihza Mahendra stated.

Minister Yusril said that Article 24C of the 1945 Constitution stipulates that the Constitutional Court's ruling is the first and last verdict that is final and binding. "We highly respect this,” the Minister said in a press statement in Jakarta on Friday, as reported by rri.co.id.

The Constitutional Court abolished Article 222 of Law No. 7/2017 on General Election because the article was considered contradict the 1945 Constitution.

The article required that political parties or alliance of political parties to have won 20 percent of the seats in the House of Representatives or 25 percent of the national valid votes of the preceding legislative election to nominate a president and vice-president candidate pair.

The Constitutional Court's ruling gives each political party participating in the election to nominate a pair of presidential and vice-presidential candidates.

Requests for a judicial review of Article 222 of the Election Law has been filed more than 30 times, but only this time it was granted.

“All parties, including the government, are bound to the Constitutional Court's ruling, without any chance of taking a legal action. The government sees a change in the Constitutional Court's attitude towards the constitutionality of the norm of Article 222 of the Election Law compared to previous rulings," Minister Yusril said.

He said the government would discuss the implications of the decision internally, especially regarding the regulation on the 2029 presidential election.

“If changes and additional norms are needed in the Election Law due to the elimination of the presidential nomination threshold, the government will work on it together with the House of Representatives,” the Minister said. ***