Losing candidate Prabowo Subianto had claimed April’s poll was rigged against him

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

Indonesia’s constitutional court has rejected a lawsuit filed by the presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto, who has for months alleged April’s election – was rigged against him.

During a marathon court session in Jakarta on Thursday, a panel of nine judges unanimously ruled against the former army general.

Concluding a court session that lasted almost nine hours, the chief justice, Anwar Usman, said the court completely rejected the petition.

Prabowo has claimed the presidential poll was marred by systemic electoral fraud, arguing millions of votes were stolen, and that the president, Joko Widodo, had co-opted state institutions, including the police and intelligence agency, to secure his re-election.

The panel of judges took turns to rigorously address the claims of vote buying, “money politics” and abuse of state power, ruling there was insufficient evidence to support them.

“The allegations of structured, systematic and massive fraud could not be proven and therefore the argument is legally baseless,” one justice, Aswanto, told the court.

Judges described the evidence and witnesses presented as weak, and noted that broader allegations of systemic voter fraud were beyond its remit and should be addressed by the elections supervisory body, Bawaslu. Earlier on Thursday the supreme court rejected a lawsuit submitted by the Prabowo camp against Bawaslu.

The election ruling, which cannot be appealed against and was the last legal recourse for Prabowo, means the result of the bitterly divisive poll will be upheld, with Widodo president for a second and final term.

The official results showed Jokowi and the vice-president-elect, Ma’ruf Amin, won 55.5% of the vote over Prabowo’s 44.5%.

Prabowo, who also refused to concede defeat when he lost to Jokowi in 2014, responded by saying he respected the court’s decision.

The legal battle over the election has cast a shadow of political uncertainty over the world’s third-largest democracy, with tensions culminating in deadly rioting last month.

Nine people were killed and hundreds injured during consecutive nights of protests after rioters clashed with police in the worst political violence in Jakarta for more than a decade.

This week Amnesty International Indonesia claimed police had tortured at least five of the protesters and called for an independent inquiry into what it described as “grave human rights violations”.

About 47,000 security personnel were deployed in the capital on Thursday and several roads around the court were closed in anticipation of further protests. Hundreds of peaceful protesters gathered in central Jakarta to await the court’s decision but disbanded before nightfall, hours before the final verdict.

Speaking to the press before boarding a plane to Japan for the G20 meeting, Widodo called for an end to a climate of political division. “There is no more 01 or 02,” he said, referring to the candidates’ electoral numbers. “What we have is Indonesian unity.”