Jakarta – With national elections around the corner, the House of Representatives has limited time to meet its legislation target.

Trimedya Panjaitan of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) said Tuesday all lawmakers in the House would shift their focus to preparations for the legislative election, scheduled for April 5, 2009.

"I predict lawmakers will be busier in the months to come as the political tension increases ahead of the 2009 election," Trimedya said.

The current House has 280 bills on the table before it completes its five-year term in August next year. In the last four years, the lawmakers have passed just 104 bills.

According to the 2008 law on elections, the campaign period for the legislative election will begin nine months before polling day, or July 5.

The House approved the long campaign period after political parties complained that in the last elections they did not have time to introduce their programs to the public.

In addition to preparing for the national election, lawmakers will also be helping their parties' candidates win governor, mayor and regent posts in the remaining 34 regional elections.

In a speech to mark the resumption of the House's sitting period on Monday, Speaker Agung Laksono urged lawmakers to deal with the backlog of bills. Unlike in the past, he did not set a specific legislation target.

"We beg the active participation of all lawmakers, because we only have 10 months of effective time to carry on our legislative duty, not including the recesses," Agung said.

Theo L. Sambuaga, who chairs of House Commission I overseeing defense and foreign affairs, blamed the lawmakers' failure to meet the legislative target on the six-month consolidation process the House went through at the beginning of its term.

He said lawmakers also seemed more interested in summoning administration officials to question them about certain issues rather than deliberating bills. "This is something that we need to improve," said Theo, who is a senior Golkar Party politician.

Trimedya, who chairs House Commission III overseeing legal affairs, said the House's standing orders often slowed the deliberation of bills. "The standing orders stipulate that all members of a committee debating a bill must attend all the meetings, while most of us work for at least two committees," Trimedya said.

Irwan Prayitno, who heads House Commission X overseeing education, does not consider the failure to meet the legislation target an important matter. He said he was concerned more on the quality of a bill.

"The long process is the nature of a bill deliberation. Lawmakers must take into account all parties' interests, which is time consuming," he said.

Irwan insisted that the House could not be forced to meet artificial targets, saying this would only compromise the quality of legislative products.

The House has begun deliberation of 71 bills, 23 of which are nearing completion.

Agung said the House had to finish debating priority bills, particularly the presidential election bill, the bill on the composition of legislative bodies and the ministerial office bill.

Agung said the House also would prioritize the revision of laws on the Supreme Court, the Judicial Commission and the Constitutional Court, and the bill on sharia banking and the mineral and coal mining bill. (alf)