Millions of Votes Wasted Due to Parliamentary Threshold

The Constitutional Court (MK) has ruled that the current parliamentary threshold regulations need to be revised, with the changes taking effect from the 2029 General Election.

This decision is based on several considerations, one of which is that the parliamentary threshold often renders millions of votes cast in the election as "wasted votes."

This is recorded in MK Decision Number 116/PUU-XXI/2023, announced on Thursday (29/2/2024), regarding a lawsuit against the parliamentary threshold filed by the Association for Elections and Democracy (Perludem).

In its decision, the MK stated that the parliamentary threshold is essentially a method to simplify the number of political parties in the DPR (House of Representatives), aiming to strengthen, improve the effectiveness, and stabilize the presidential system.

However, in practice, this regulation often nullifies or "wastes" the votes of parties that do not reach the minimum threshold.

Quoting the MK's records, in the 2009 election, the number of wasted votes that could not be converted into DPR seats reached 19.05 million votes, equivalent to 18% of the total national valid votes.

Then, in the 2014 election, 2.96 million votes were wasted, equivalent to 2.4% of the total national valid votes.

Furthermore, in the 2019 election, 13.6 million votes were wasted due to a similar issue, equivalent to 9.7% of the total national valid votes.

Considering the above data, in its decision, the MK stated:

"These facts prove that the constitutional rights of voters used in the election have been nullified or not counted under the pretext of simplifying political parties."

"Meanwhile, the principle of democracy places the people as the sovereign owners as stipulated in Article 1 paragraph (2) of the 1945 Constitution, yet the parliamentary threshold policy has reduced the rights of the people as voters."

"The right of the people to be elected is also reduced when they receive more votes but do not become members of the DPR because their party does not reach the parliamentary threshold."

The MK then decided that the current parliamentary threshold regulations need to be revised, taking into account the following guidelines:

(1) Designed for continuous use;

(2) Changes to the parliamentary threshold norm, including the amount or percentage of the parliamentary threshold, must remain within the framework of maintaining the proportionality of the proportional electoral system, especially to prevent a large number of votes from being unconvertible into DPR seats;

(3) Changes must be made in order to achieve the simplification of political parties;

(4) Changes must be completed before the commencement of the 2029 General Election stages; and

(5) Changes must involve all parties concerned with the organization of general elections by applying the principle of meaningful public participation, including involving participating political parties that do not have representatives in the DPR.