Adianto P. Simamora, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Thu, 04/03/2008 1:37 AM
The General Elections Commission (KPU) announced yesterday it would open registration Monday for political parties wanting to contest next year's elections.
It said all parties with secured legal entity status, including new ones and those in the House of Representatives, must register at the national elections body before May 12.
"Our office will open to the parties from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. until May 12. On the final day, we will open until midnight," said KPU chairman Abdul Hafiz Anshary.
The announcement was made after President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono signed the much-awaited election law on Monday, a month after the House passed it.
"As the President has signed the election law, we are now ready to prepare for next year's general elections," Abdul said on the sidelines of a seminar on verification of political parties.
The seminar was attended mostly by cadres from new parties currently undergoing administrative screening at the Justice and Human Rights Ministry.
Abdul said the KPU would only screen registered parties, including new ones that passed the verification process at the ministry.
The eight minor parties that took part in the 2004 elections but failed to secure seats at the current House would face screening, he said.
He said 16 minor and major parties currently represented at the House would be exempt from the KPU's verification process.
Abdul said the KPU was waiting for the screening's final results on 47 parties by the justice ministry before starting to verify the contestants for upcoming polls.
The ministry is expected to announce the parties eligible to register with the KPU on Monday.
Another KPU member, Andi Nurpati, said the office would audit the parties to determine whether they met the requirements as set in the 2008 law on political parties.
The law partially requires the party to have at least 50 members with chapters in at least 60 percent of the country's 33 provinces, and branches in 50 percent of over 500 regencies.
The law also obliges the parties to allocate 30 percent of executive seats on their central boards to women.
"We will only give three days to parties failing to meet the requirements to make changes. If they fail to meet the deadline, we will remove them from the list," Andi said.
The verification process is scheduled to run from May 27 to June 27. The KPU plans to announce the eligible parties for the 2009 elections on July 5.
The KPU said the Home Affairs Ministry will provide it with temporary data on eligible voters for the elections.
The new election law is the second of four political draft laws required for next year's elections.
The House passed the law on political parties last December and will deliberate the two remaining bills on the presidential election and the composition of legislative bodies.
The law stipulates only parties with a number of residual votes equal to or more than 50 percent of the ratio between available seats and the number of votes cast could secure the residual seats.
Any smaller percentage of votes would be collected at the provincial level.
