Yustinus Paat, Jakarta – The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) will retain the speakership of the House of Representatives based on internal rules that award the position to the winner of the legislative election.

A senior House member from a rival party confirmed on Thursday that there will be no changes in the internal rules.

The PDI-P narrowly won the election with 16.7 percent of the vote, just 1.4 percentage points above the Golkar Party.

Deputy Speaker Sufmi Dasco Ahmad said the majority of incumbent political parties had agreed to leave the internal regulation on House speakership unchanged, dismissing rumors of ongoing maneuver to unseat House Speaker Puan Maharani, the daughter of PDI-P Chairwoman Megawati Soekarnoputri.

"We agreed not to amend the internal regulations until the current term expires," said Dasco, an executive with the Great Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra).

He admitted that certain representatives have proposed the inclusion of the House's internal rulings into the priority list of the upcoming legislation but their proposals gained no response.

Furthermore, the proposed amendment didn't target procedures in selecting the House speaker, he added.

"The majority of us agreed that incumbent parties in the parliament will not revise the regulations," Dasco said.

Last month, PDI-P Secretary-General Hasto Kristiyanto warned the closest rival, the Golkar Party, to refrain from attempting to seize the speakership, citing the 2018 law on legislature governance, which grants the winning party the right to appoint the House speaker.

Hasto referred to the House speaker selection in 2014, won by then Golkar politician Setya Novanto following a collective move among several parties to form a majority coalition against the election winner PDI-P. Setya later became the Golkar chairman in 2016 but resigned from both the House speaker and Golkar chairman positions in December 2017 after being named a corruption suspect.

"Don't try to provoke the PDI-P, which showed great patience during the 2014 incident. The speaker from the 2014 election ended up facing trouble and prison time. Bad karma follows complete disregard for ethics and values," Hasto said.

Source: https://jakartaglobe.id/news/pdip-to-retain-house-speakership-as-internal-rules-stay-unchange