Jakarta (ANTARA) - Speaker of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) Bambang Soesatyo is optimistic that the next president elected through the 2024 presidential election would be able to continue the ongoing development efforts.

"We hope that the next elected president, whoever that will be, will be consistently taking positive steps and willing to sustain national development efforts that have been started by the predecessors," he remarked in Jakarta on Wednesday.

Soesatyo made the statement at the 2023 Annual Session of the People's Consultative Assembly (MPR) and the 2023 Joint Session of the House of Representatives (DPR) and the Regional Representatives Council (DPD).

Soesatyo then appealed to all parties to show full support for the successors of President Joko Widodo and Vice President Ma'ruf Amin, so they can continue the efforts to develop Indonesia.

"For the sake of realizing an advanced Indonesia, we all must support whoever the elected president and vice president will be," he affirmed.

The MPR speaker reiterated that the process of democracy does not stop at the stages of elections and transfer of power, adding that the people should continue to maintain the spirit of democracy by supporting their leaders to formulate beneficial policies.

"With such a spirit, let us welcome the 2024 General Elections to realize a constitutional democracy while preserving the unity and integrity of the nation," he affirmed.

He also alluded to the development of political constellations ahead of the presidential election, where three potential candidates for presidency -- Ganjar Pranowo, Prabowo Subianto, and Anies Baswedan -- have come under the public spotlight.

"All communities from Aceh to Papua have acknowledged who will be the presidential candidates, even though it is still unclear who will run for the vice presidential spot," he noted.

According to the schedule announced by the General Elections Commission (KPU), presidential and vice presidential candidates will be able to register themselves starting from October 19 to November 25, 2023.

Law No. 7 of 2017 on General Elections stipulates that pairs of presidential and vice presidential candidates can be proposed by political parties or political party coalitions that occupy at least 20 percent of the total seats in DPR or share 25 percent of the total national valid votes in the previous legislative election.

Currently, the parliament has 575 seats.

Hence, candidates for president and vice president keen to run for the executive positions are required to have support from at least 115 DPR seats or support from parties or coalitions that had garnered a minimum of 34,992,703 valid votes in the 2019 election.

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Translator: Tegar Nurfitra Putra Rofian
Editor: Sri Haryati
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