Through the deliberation of the draft omnibus laws, the lawmakers will also probably revise the existing electoral systems, including whether elections should be held simultaneously.

Home Minister Tito Karnavian met on Wednesday with secretaries-general from political parties at the House of Representatives to discuss the issue.

The Home Ministry's acting director-general for politics and government, Bahtiar, said that by drafting compatible legislation on elections, he hoped there would be no need for law amendments every time the country organized elections, as occurs today.

He said some issues might surface during the deliberation, such as whether the legislative and presidential elections should be held simultaneously and whether direct regional elections in certain provinces should be scrapped.

“I think we are open to any possible modification. All parties have shared their views,” Bahtiar said on Wednesday, adding that political system reform was important amid the prevailing problems of democracy, such as a lack of transparency, high-cost elections and political corruption.

The idea of reorganizing the country’s political system through the issuance of omnibus laws was proposed by House Commission II overseeing home affairs to the Home Ministry in December 2019, when they were discussing which bills should be included in the 2020-2024 National Legislation Program (Prolegnas), said the commission’s chairman Ahmad Doli Kurnia of the Golkar Party.

Ahmad concurred with Bahtiar, saying certain issues might arise during the deliberation, such as whether the legislative and presidential elections should be held on the same day, whether the elections would maintain the open-list system or return to the closed-list system or even use a mixed-member system and whether the current legislative threshold should be maintained.

“We are gathering inputs. For example, there are those who want to give the DPRDs [regional legislative councils] the authority to elect regional heads, or to use an 'asymmetrical' approach,” Ahmad said, referring to a system suggested by Tito, in which some regions maintain direct elections, while others, particularly conflict-prone ones such as Papua, do not.

The House and the government, Ahmad said, would produce three laws regarding the state’s political grand design, namely an omnibus law that merges the General Elections Law and Regional Elections Law, an omnibus law that merges the Political Parties Law and Legislative Institutions (MD3) Law and an omnibus law on local administration that merges the Local Administration Law and State and Regional Treasury Law.

“If that’s too complex, we will make it two [omnibus laws] by merging elections and politics,” Ahmad said, adding that the commission had submitted a revision of the General Elections Law to be included in the Prolegnas. 

“That’s the entry point for the changes,” he said.

The draft omnibus laws are expected to be completed in early 2021, at the latest, according to Ahmad. The House will be responsible for the elections law. While the government is preparing the whole grand concept of the political system.

“We’ve held five elections since the Reform Era, but we [often] change the laws before every election. We’ve gone through trial and error. It’s time to make it no longer an experiment,” Ahmad said, referring to the time since the historic downfall of then-president Soeharto’s authoritarian New Order regime in May 1998.

United Development Party (PPP) secretary-general Arsul Sani said that during the meeting with Tito, all political parties agreed that the one-day simultaneous elections should be reevaluated.

The parties were also open to an evaluation of the regional elections system.

“For example, should all the provinces, cities and districts choose their leaders directly? Or should we let the DPRD choose the governors and mayors? We discussed that,” Arsul said.

However, the PPP, currently the smallest party in the government coalition, hopes the revision will not result in an increase in the threshold for entry into the House. “We hope it does not rise. This plan is still in process. We will listen to what the government proposes,” Arsul said.

The largest party in the government coalition, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), agreed that the Elections Law and Regional Elections Law must be changed and merged into one.

“The aim of the change is to avoid costly elections and conflict among the people,” PDI-P secretary-general Hasto Kristiyanto said.

Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) secretary-general Mustafa Kamal said that during Wednesday’s meeting Tito had asked political parties to look at the Indonesian Institute of Sciences’ (LIPI) study on asymmetrical elections.

In its study, LIPI explained that the regional elections should be carried out by considering each region’s quality of human resources, which is reflected in the Human Development Index, and the region’s financial capacity.

Months ago, Tito came up with the idea of reevaluating direct regional elections, citing the potential for conflict in some regions, with violent clashes between tribes and identity politics.

Commission II deputy chairman Saan Mustopa of the NasDem Party said each faction at the House had started reviewing the electoral system, as well as the political and governmental system. The commission would later consult with various institutions, such as LIPI, the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) and civil society groups 

“We will also invite the public to provide input,” Saan said.

Election watchdog Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem) researcher Fadli Ramadhanil said that elections under prevailing laws were inconsistent, unsynchronized or not harmonized and often overlapped with each other. Thus, the plan to merge the current laws on elections into omnibus laws would be a great move.

However, he highlighted that the public should be involved during the deliberations.

General Elections Commission (KPU) member Viryan Azis said there were dozens of laws related to electoral matters that should be merged into one. However, he hoped that the change would be carried out in a participatory spirit by involving all the stakeholders.

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