National – A researcher from the Indonesian Survey Circle (LSI) said that Islam-based parties should merge themselves into no more than two parties to survive in the crowded political environment.

"If Islam-based political parties still want to have influence, they must merge into only two political parties," LSI researcher Adjie Alfaraby said as quoted by kompas.com.

He said that currently, voters were having problems telling the difference between Islam-based political parties because they all shared similar ideologies and programs.

Adjie also said that although the majority of Indonesians were Muslim, a large number of them had secular views on the relationship between religion and politics.

Last week, two opinion polls predicted that none of the existing Islam-based political parties would remain among the top five parties in the 2014 general election.

LSI found that, if the general election were to take place today, the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS), the National Awakening Party (PKB), the National Mandate Party (PAN) and the United Development Party (PPP), would only collectively garner 21.1 percent of the popular vote.