T

he Constitutional Court upheld on Tuesday the victory of incumbent South Sumatra Governor Alex Noerdin in the provincial election.

The panel ruled that in a repeat election in September, in four municipalities and regencies and one district, Alex garnered only 456,887 votes, while his competitor, Herman Deru, gained 734,818 votes.

The repeat election was held after the court found Alex guilty of misusing the provincial budget to secure his victory in those areas during the original election in June.

After the September revote, which covered 15 regencies across the province, Alex and his running mate, Ishak Mekki, won 1,447,799 votes, followed by Herman and his running mate, Maphilinda, with 1,389,169 votes. In the June poll, Alex and Ishak had garnered 1,405,510 votes, followed by Herman and Maphilinda with 1,258,240 votes.

'The court orders the South Sumatra General Elections Commission [KPUD] to follow the ruling,' Constitutional Court deputy chief justice Hamdan Zoelva said on Tuesday.

The justices also concluded that they had found 'no systemic violations' and could not, therefore, annul Alex's victory. They did suggest, however, that the alleged violations be brought to the attention of the police and other law enforcement agencies.

'As to the allegation of vote rigging, although voters received two invitations, they each cast only one ballot on one occasion,' justice Maria Farida Indrati said.

The court instructed in July the South Sumatra KPUD to hold repeat ballots in East Ogan Komering Ulu regency; Ogan Komering Ulu regency; South Ogan Komering Ulu regency; Palembang municipality, and South Warkuk Ranau district in South Ogan Komering Ulu, as they found Alex had channeled Rp 1.4 trillion of provincial social aid funding to buy votes through a number of social organizations in the province.

The Rp 1.4 trillion was used to purchase 1,500 motorcycles in East Ogan Komering Ulu regency, Ogan Komering Ulu regency and Palembang municipality, as well as funding the distribution of basic supplies in Palembang municipality.

Alex, a politician with the Golkar Party, has also been implicated in a massive graft case centering on the construction of the athletes' village at the Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in Palembang, South Sumatra.

In mid-June, the South Sumatra KPUD announced that Alex ' who lost his bid in the Jakarta gubernatorial election last year to Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo ' and Ishak had been elected governor and deputy governor for 2013-2018.

The South Sumatra KPUD announced that from a total of 5,820,453 registered voters across 15 regencies and municipalities, 3,901,334 voters had cast their ballots in the election, in which more than 141,596 were deemed invalid.