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Legislators revealed plans on Wednesday to file a motion of no confidence against House of Representatives Speaker Marzuki Alie over his call to disband the antigraft agency.

Bambang Soesatyo, from the Golkar Party, said he had spoken with other lawmakers and was confident the measure against the senior Democratic Party member would succeed.

“We’re going to do it,” he said. “On August 16 we will begin petitioning support from lawmakers. Marzuki’s statements are an affront to the House. He needs to be evaluated.”

Marzuki raised the ire of fellow legislators and the public alike when he suggested last week that the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK) be disbanded following allegations by a graft fugitive that some of its officials were guilty of ethical breaches.

The controversy is just the latest sparked by the gaffe-prone Marzuki, who once said the victims of a tsunami in West Sumatra had courted the disaster by living by the shore.

Bambang said he hoped the no-confidence motion would at least lead to “moral sanctions” against the speaker.

“It will show that we no longer have any confidence in him,” he said. “We also want to force the Democrats to consider removing him as the House speaker and replacing him with someone smarter.”

Cecep Effendi, a political expert from Muhammadiyah University Jakarta (UMJ), agreed that as the House speaker, Marzuki should have been more careful with his comments.

“The position of House speaker is very sacred. He shouldn’t have stated something controversial like that,” he said.

He added that while the other legislators were entitled to seek a motion of no confidence, it was ultimately the Democrats who had the authority to decide on whether to pull Marzuki from the House.

Cecep said this would depend largely on whether the ruling party viewed him and his proclivity for controversial statements as a liability.

Eva Kusuma Sundari, a legislator from the opposition Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), agreed that the rest of the parties in the House could do no more than push the Democrats to replace Marzuki, because the Legislative Bodies Law stated that only the ruling party could replace the speaker.

However, she said this should not obviate the need for an evaluation of Marzuki because there was a need to make clear to the public that his attitude was not representative of the House. As a legislator, Eva said, she was dissatisfied with Marzuki’s leadership.

“His ideas are not the same as ours, or even those of his own party,” she said.

However, senior Democrats have played down the controversy, backing Marzuki’s claim that his remarks on the KPK were taken out of context.

“As far as I’m concerned, he has explained his statement,” E.E. Mangindaan, the minister for administrative reforms, said at the Presidential Palace.

“People quoted only part of his statement. As for the proposed motion of no confidence, I don’t want to intervene in House affairs. If that’s what Bambang Soesatyo wants, then go ahead. We’ll see whether it succeeds or not.”

He added that the Democrats were dealing with the controversy in their own way, but would not speculate on the possibility that Marzuki would be replaced as speaker.

“I can’t say whether we’re going to keep him or not, as it’s not clear whether he’s guilty or not,” Mangindaan said. “We haven’t spoken about it, but I think we should refer to official statements instead of making up stories.”

Jero Wacik, the culture and tourism minister and a senior Democrat, said the party’s ethics council had grilled a number of officials, but refused to say over what issue or whether Marzuki had been summoned.

“It was all cleared up last night. That chapter is closed,” he said.