JAKARTA, LEGAL LITERACY — Constitutional Court (MK) decided to grant the Petition for Case Number 05-01-12-38/PHPU.DPR-DPRD-XXII/2024 submitted by the National Mandate Party (PAN) regarding the filling of legislative candidates in the Southwest Papua Province. In its decision, the Constitutional Court ordered a Re-Vote due to violations in which legislative candidates from the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) also served as KPPS members. This verdict was read out by the Chief Justice of the Constitutional Court, Suhartoyo, on Thursday (6/6/2024) in the Plenary Session Room, Building 1, MK Jakarta.

“Granting the petitioner's request in its entirety. Stating that the results of the vote acquisition for candidates for the Southwest Papua People's Representative Council for the Southwest Papua Electoral District 3 at TPS 07 and TPS 18, Malawele Village, Aimas District, Sorong Regency, Southwest Papua Province must be re-voted,” said the Chair of the Panel of Judges, Suhartoyo, accompanied by 8 other Constitutional Justices.

The Court in its considerations stated by Constitutional Justice Arief Hidayat stated that the dishonesty of Susiati Making and Nani Mariana as KPPS, according to reasonable reasoning, could create a conflict of interest in the implementation of the election.

Because related to declaring their identity as legislative candidates as well as members of the Prosperous Justice Party at the time of registration as KPPS was carried out dishonestly, especially in carrying out their duties as election organizers. According to the Court, this can certainly potentially be unprofessional and unaccountable and/or the tendency will benefit themselves or their party. Regarding such legal facts, the Court believes that it is not in accordance with statutory regulations, especially the implementation process which must be based on the principles of direct, general, free, secret, honest and fair (Luber and Jurdil) as regulated in Article 2 of the Election Law whose spirit is the same as Article 22E paragraph (1) of the 1945 Constitution.

Furthermore, the Court believes that this violation will create doubts about the validity and legitimacy of the vote acquisition of each Political Party. This kind of violation also injures the principles of democracy and election principles. The violation was committed by Susiati Making, a candidate for DPRD member of Sorong Regency from the Prosperous Justice Party with serial number 2 in the Sorong 3 Electoral District (dapil), who also served as Chair of KPPS at TPS 07, Malawele Village, Aimas District, Sorong Regency. In addition, Nani Mariana, a candidate for DPRD member of Sorong Regency from the Prosperous Justice Party with serial number 2 in the Sorong 2 Electoral District (dapil), also served as a KPPS Member at TPS 18, Malawele Village, Aimas District, Sorong Regency. This causes problems regarding the validity of the vote acquisition at the TPS.

The Court emphasized that, with regard to the issue of the validity of the vote acquisition, it is important to first explain the design of the 2024 election contest. The 2024 election contest consists of five types of elections: election of candidates for President and Vice President, election of candidates for Members of the House of Representatives, election of candidates for Members of the Regional Representative Council, election of candidates for Members of the Southwest Papua People's Representative Council (Province), and election of candidates for Members of the Regional People's Representative Council of Regency/City.

However, the Applicant in his application only highlighted election violations that are closely related to the Applicant's and Related Party's vote acquisition, where there is a difference of 2 (two) votes which potentially determines the acquisition of the 7th seat in the election of candidates for Members of the Southwest Papua People's Representative Council. This was re-emphasized by the Applicant in the description of his application which only requested a re-vote at TPS 07 and TPS 18 in Malawele Village, Aimas District, Sorong Regency, throughout the Southwest Papua 3 Electoral District.

That is, the other four types of elections are not directly related to the interests of the Applicant. Therefore, in order to obtain the purity and truth of the vote acquisition of each Political Party and to increase the legitimacy of the vote acquisition of each Political Party, as well as to realize the principle of democracy that respects every voter's vote, and also to uphold the principles of general elections that are Luber and Jurdil, the Court is of the opinion that a re-vote must be carried out only for one type of ballot paper, namely the ballot paper for the Southwest Papua People's Representative Council (Province) Electoral District (dapil) Southwest Papua 3.