The House of Representatives unanimously endorsed on Tuesday a new bill on electoral administration, which politicians claim will improve the quality of elections and democracy in the country.

But such a claim looks too good to be true, or perhaps groundless, as the bill reopens the door for political parties' direct involvement in the work of the General Elections Commission (KPU), which the House closed in 2003 for the sake of free and fair elections.

Instead of leading the nation towards mature democracy, the new bill marks a setback for the country's endeavor to create a better mechanism of elite rotation, which has so far resulted only in representatives of the people being more loyal to their political parties than to their constituents.

First and the foremost, the new bill paves the way for breaches of the spirit of free and fair elections by allowing representatives of political parties to sit in the KPU and the Elections Supervisory Body (Bawaslu). The bill says the KPU is open to anyone capable and competent. Party members can vie for seats in the institution as long as they have already quit their parties when they register their candidacy.

We can imagine the conflicts of interest within the KPU, which should play a role as an impartial referee, if figures with close affiliations to political parties rule the commission. The existing law, which will soon expire, stipulates that seats in the KPU can go to party members who have resigned from their parties at least five years prior to their selection.

Indonesia's last two elections, in 2004 and 2009, respectively, were administered by a KPU that was relatively free from influence or intervention by political parties. Those elected as KPU members were primarily scholars with no political affiliations.

The fact that some of the commissioners were implicated in corruption cases, which many said was simply due to their lack of experience in managing huge funds, did not affect the credibility of the election process. It comes as no surprise if the international community considered Indonesian elections a model of democracy.

KPU seats were filled by representatives of the government and political parties in the first democratic elections in 1999 but the composition was quite acceptable, given the ongoing political transition from authoritarianism to democracy.

The transition period has long and there is no way to turn back the clock, unless the power brokers are willing to hijack democracy for their own interests.

Prolonged debates over the administering of the most recent elections in 2009 may have triggered the move to reinstate the role of political parties within the KPU, which several less successful parties see as partiality toward the ruling party. Discontent with the long overdue issue of electoral roll fraud has marked several hearings with KPU members at the House.

Efforts to delegitimize the 2009 election results are also evident in the House's ongoing move to reveal mafia practice within the KPU, which implicates former commissioner Andi Nurpati, now an executive within President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's Democratic Party.

Andi's move to the Democratic Party raised many eyebrows, as it took place almost unnoticed, until she appeared donning party colors at the party's congress last year.

But whatever the reasons behind the House's endorsement of the new electoral administration bill, the independence of KPU members must not be compromised. Perhaps in the coming five years, the power hungry political elites will intend to pass a new bill that will let political parties negotiate election results?

Therefore, once the bill is enacted, a move to challenge it at the Constitutional Court is highly recommended if Indonesia is committed to free and fair elections.