Supreme Court's ruling annuls presidential election results: Analyst

A political expert says that the recent ruling by the Supreme Court to annul the second phase counting of the April legislative elections by the General Elections Commission (KPU) could also cancel the July 8 presidential election results.

"Based on the court's ruling, several parties, such as the Greater Indonesian Movement Party (Gerindra) and the People's Conscience Party (Hanura), will lose a significant number of their seats at the House of Representatives," an expert from Paramadina University, Yudi Latif, said during a discussion at the Regional Representatives Council in Senayan, South Jakarta, Friday.

"Such a loss will make them ineligible to get into the House. That will also make them ineligible to support the bid of a presidential candidate," he added.

Both Hanura and Gerindra formed a coalition with bigger parties to support their bids for a candidate.

Hanura formed a coalition with the Golkar Party to support the candidacy of Jusuf Kalla, the latter's chairman and current vice-president.

On the other hand, Gerindra established a coalition with the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) to support the candidacy of Megawati Soekarnoputri, a former president and PDI-P's chairwoman.

However, based on the court's ruling, Hanura would only gain six seats at the House and Gerindra would only gain 10 seats.

"The minimum number of seats that a party must gain to enter the House is 14. Without the additional seats from Gerindra and Hanura, both PDI-P and Golkar would not have sufficient seat percentage to name a candidate in the first place," Yudi said.

"And without any candidate from Golkar and PDI-P, then there would be only one presidential candidate, which is not in line with the law," he added.

Indonesian law stipulates that a presidential election can only take place when there is more than one presidential candidate.

The Supreme Court ruled on June 18 to cancel the results of the April legislative elections second phase vote counting by the KPU.

Under the now-annulled counting, the second phase calculation involved the allocation of seats to parties. Parties that had gained seats during the first phase are not allowed to use the votes gained in the first phase.

However, the Supreme Court ruled that the votes used by the winning parties in the first phase were to be used again in the second phase, costing parties with smaller votes their legislative seats in the next House.

At least 66 seats would be allocated to major parties at the expense of minor parties, according to a count simulation by Cetro. Around 1,300 regional legislative council seats would shift ownership as well. (hdt)