Anita Rachman – The Golkar Party lashed out on Monday against a decision by the House of Representatives to propose raising the legislative threshold to 3 percent.

Golkar legislator Nurul Arifin said her party had been holding out for a 5 percent threshold, which is the minimum number of votes nationwide that a party must win in order to be represented in the House. "Golkar insists on 5 percent," she said. "What the people want is a simplification of the political party system."

She was speaking after Thursday's meeting of the House Legislation Body to agree on a threshold figure for the proposed amendment of the 2008 Elections Law, which ended without agreement and prompted the body's chairman to settle on the figure of 3 percent.

"The chairman was being authoritarian," Nurul said. "He banged his gavel [to end the meeting] before we could say something."

The lack of agreement stemmed from the various proposals tabled by different parties. Golkar and the opposition Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), the second- and third-biggest factions at the House, are seeking a doubling of the current threshold from 2.5 percent to 5 percent.

The ruling Democratic Party wants it to be 4 percent, while the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) is pushing for between 3 and 4 percent. The five smaller parties all want it to stay at 2.5 percent.

Ignatius Mulyono, chairman of the House Legislation Body, said he had gone with 3 percent because that was the figure previously agreed on by all parties.

Ahmad Yani, from the United Development Party (PPP), said that if Golkar reneged on the earlier agreement and insisted on 5 percent, then the PPP could do likewise on other issues it had compromised on.

"That was the agreement," he said, referring to the 3 percent threshold. "If Golkar scraps it, I want a whole new set of discussions, starting from the beginning."

He added a simpler option would be to let the government determine the figure, which would be deliberated later anyway by the House.

Nurul agreed that there was no point on reaching consensus on a figure now, given that the 3 percent proposed by the legislative body would likely be revised once the draft amendment was deliberated. However, she added that if the body had to come up with a number for the legislative threshold, they could have taken it to a vote.

The Democrats have 13 members in the 51-seat body, while Golkar has 10. The PDI-P has seven, the PKS has five and the rest have two to four.