Irman Gusman - (JP/Awo)

Soon after the fall of president Soeharto'€™s authoritarian regime in 1998, Indonesia amended its 1945 Constitution four times in the course of four years in an attempt to curtail overwhelming presidential authority and reform the country'€™s checks and balances system by redistributing power among the executive, legislative and judicial bodies.

 Among the milestone achievements from the four amendments were the introduction of direct presidential elections, the limitation of presidential tenures to two five-year terms, the termination of the military'€™s political role, the separation of the police from the military and the establishment of the Regional Representatives Council (DPD).

 Like members of the House of Representatives, DPD members are elected during legislative elections for a five-year term, with the former representing political parties and the latter representing regions. Each province, regardless of the population size, is represented by four DPD members.

Together, lawmakers and DPD members form the People'€™s Consultative Assembly (MPR) that has authority to, among other things, amend the Constitution and impeach the president at the request of the House.

Despite the introduction of the bicameral representation system, the DPD had found itself struggling to counterbalance the House'€™s lawmaking power as the Constitution only granted the institution with very limited authority.

After a string of failed attempts to propose the amendments, hope was renewed in late September last year after the MPR issued a decree recommending the current serving MPR members carry out the amendment.

The internal decree also cited the eight areas the MPR working team has recommended to become subjects of constitutional reorganization, including the reinforcement of the MPR role in providing policy directions to other state institutions, the organization of the DPD authority to propose, deliberate and approve certain bills and the simplification of the political party system to reinforce the presidential system of government.

DPD Speaker Irman Gusman, who was reelected as DPD speaker for the 2014-2019 period, considered the issuance of the decree as a landmark achievement for the institution.

'€œMany countries underwent their constitutional amendment process in chaos, but Indonesia has so far seen the process running peacefully,'€ he said.

DPD member Bambang Sadono, who leads the DPD faction in the MPR, said that the discussion between the DPD and the House'€™s 10 factions about details of the draft Constitutional amendment was currently ongoing.

'€œIt [the constitutional amendment] is not a race against time,'€ Bambang said.

'€œThe most important thing is how to ensure that the proposed draft amendment receives full support from all political factions.'€

Not all lawmakers, however, welcome the DPD'€™s enthusiastic efforts to propose a fifth constitutional amendment.

United Development Party (PPP) lawmaker Arsul Sani, for example, questioned the urgency of the proposal.

'€œIf DPD members want to strengthen their lawmaking authority, why don'€™t they urge for the amendment of the MD3 [Legislative Institutions] Law, or the issuance of a separate DPD Law, instead of proposing a constitutional amendment that needs so much political effort,'€ the lawyer-turned-politician said.

Irman, however, argued that he was not worried about the criticism since many lawmakers were newcomers who had no prior knowledge about the story behind the constitutional amendment proposal.

'€œWhat these lawmakers need is to consult with their faction leaders about the amendment issue,'€ he said.

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