It's official: Prabowo is Indonesia's next president after landslide win

JAKARTA – Mr Prabowo Subianto has won the Feb 14 Indonesian presidential election by a landslide, official results show, signaling continuity in government policy when his popular predecessor, Mr Joko Widodo, steps down in October after a decade in power.

The formal count by the General Elections Commission (KPU), announced on March 20, showed Mr Prabowo and his running mate Gibran Rakabuming Raka, son of President Widodo, had won 96,214,691 votes, representing 58.59 per cent of the total ballots cast.

Their opponents – former Jakarta governor Anies Baswedan and his running mate, veteran politician Muhaimin Iskandar – garnered 40,971,906 votes, or 24.95 per cent of the vote share, while former Central Java governor Ganjar Pranowo, who paired with former chief law and security minister Mahfud MD, received 27,040,878 votes, or 16.47 per cent.

The results did not differ significantly from the unofficial quick counts by pollsters, which predicted on election day that the Prabowo-Gibran team would secure nearly 60 per cent of the total votes.

The pair also won in 36 of 38 provinces, securing between 41 per cent and 75 per cent of the votes in each. They lost to the Anies-Muhaimin team in Aceh and West Sumatra provinces.

They also won 63.7 per cent of the overseas votes, drawn from 128 foreign election committees.

With the results, Mr Prabowo, 72, and Mr Gibran, 36, have fulfilled the necessary conditions to be formally elected under Indonesian law. It stipulates that a winning team must secure more than 50 per cent of the overall vote, and at least 20 per cent of the vote in half of the provinces. They will be sworn in on Oct 20.

In the legislative election that was also held on Feb 14, the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) maintained its top spot, winning 16.72 per cent of the total votes, followed by Golkar with 15.29 per cent, and Mr Prabowo’s Gerindra party with 13.22 per cent.