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View all search resultsTop court rules to bar parties that breach 30% gender quota from legislative polls
The Constitutional Court has ruled in favor of a petition by university students, which pointed to a lack of sanctions in the General Elections Law for political parties that violated the minimum 30 percent requirement for female candidates.
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A woman casts her ballot in the 2024 general election on Feb. 14 at a polling station in Banda Aceh, Aceh. (AFP/Chaideer Mahyuddin)
T
he Constitutional Court ruled on Monday that political parties that failed to meet the minimum 30 percent quota for female candidates could be disqualified from participating in legislative elections.
In a unanimous decision welcomed by the General Elections Commission (KPU) as well as political parties, the court stated that parties contesting legislative elections at either the regional or national level must adhere to the quota or be removed from the race by the KPU.
Coming just under three years before the next legislative election in 2029, the court ruled in favor of university students who petitioned for a review of a provision in the General Elections Law that mandates the quota without stipulating sanctions for violations.
“The court holds that the absence of sanctions [in the elections law] has allowed the KPU at all levels to approve candidate lists that failed to meet the minimum 30 percent quota for female candidates [in past elections],” Justice Adies Kadir said while reading out the decision.
The nine justices of the court found “this provision [to be] “unconstitutional”, he added.
In their petition, the students pointed to the 2024 elections for the legislative councils of Tulungagung and Trenggalek regencies in East Java. They argued that the KPU could only issue warnings to political parties that did not meet the quota during the candidate registration phase, but they were otherwise allowed to proceed in these polls.
The petitioners also presented data showing that of the 18 parties contesting the 2024 election for the House of Representatives, only the medium-sized Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) had fulfilled the gender quota in all 84 electoral districts nationwide.
