Jakarta, IO – Even though the General Election Commission (KPU) has yet to announce the official vote count, president-elect Prabowo Subianto has received congratulatory messages from many world leaders. This is a strong acknowledgement of Prabowo’s victory, considering that he won by a wide margin based on the quick count results.
Indikator Politik Indonesia executive director Burhanuddin Muhtadi believes that congratulatory messages from world leaders have a very important and strategic meaning. According to him, they have had an impact on domestic politics by lending Prabowo a kind of unofficial legitimacy even though the KPU has yet to announced the official results.
“So it gives a kind of symbolic meaning that without having to wait for the formal process to be completed by KPU because the counting process is carried out in stages. The world leaders already know that even though it is still unofficial, it is very likely that the quick count results will not be much different from the real count results,” said Burhanuddin, Thursday (14/3).
He said the meaning of the congratulations in the international context signifies a peaceful national leadership transition pending the inauguration in October 2024.
“It seems that there are already preparations among world leaders that after President Jokowi, Prabowo will continue his policies,” said Burhanuddin.
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Several state leaders who have congratulated Prabowo are Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, Sri Lankan President Ranil Wickremesinghe, Russian President Vladimir Putin, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala, French President Emmanuel Macron, and Jordanian King Abdullah II.
Based on the quick count results from various pollsters, presidential pair Prabowo-Gibran won outright with 58.45 percent of votes. This means the presidential election will not go into the runoff as they have secured more than half of the legitimate votes.