Yuli Tri Suwarni, Bandung – The Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) has said it is confident of taking 20 percent of the vote in the 2009 general election.

Along with relying on its existing 600,000 members across the country, the party will also attempt to expand its base to reach nationalist and secular groups, PKS president Tifatul Sembiring said Thursday.

He said the party needed to reach 20 percent in order to be able to nominate presidential and vice presidential candidates. "We will emphasize that we are not a religious group, we are a nationalist party that is religious," Tifatul said in a press conference in Bandung on Thursday.

Tifatul said they were likely to reach the target as candidates nominated by the party in the past have won 81 out of 138 direct regional elections across the country from 2005 to August this year.

While acknowledging the party's failure to win in the recent Jakarta gubernatorial election, he said that analysis had shown that the effectiveness of a party's political machine and the loyalty of its members were determining factors in its garnering public support for its candidates.

"Currently, we're preparing to contest the upcoming direct elections in Central Java, East Java, South Sulawesi and West Java," he said.

Tifatul said the PKS planned to propose that independent candidates should have to show they had the support at least 3 percent of voters in their area.

He said the party would ask new Home Minister Mardiyanto to finish the draft law on politics and revise the 2004 Regional Administration Law.

In the 2004 legislative elections, the Golkar Party took the largest part of the vote, followed by the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle and the United Development Party.

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's Democratic Party ranked fourth, followed by the National Awakening party, the National Mandate Party and the PKS.