President claims re-election victory in Indonesia

JAKARTA, Indonesia — Indonesian President Joko Widodo said Thursday that he has won re-election after receiving an estimated 54 percent of the vote, backtracking on an earlier vow to wait for official results after his challenger made improbable claims of victory.

Widodo, after meeting with parties in his coalition, told reporters that the leaders of Malaysia, Singapore, Turkey and numerous other nations have congratulated him on securing a second term.

The vote estimate is based on so-called quick counts of a sample of polling stations by a dozen reputable survey organizations. Widodo said that 100 percent of sample polling stations have now been counted or close to that. The quick counts have been accurate in previous elections.

“We all know that the [quick count] calculation is a scientific calculation method. From the country’s experiences of past elections the accuracy is 99.9 percent, almost the same as real count results,” Widodo said.

Widodo’s rival, former Gen. Prabowo Subianto, has claimed he won 62 percent of the vote in Wednesday’s election based on his campaign’s own counts, repeating a similar claim when he lost to Widodo in 2014.

The Election Commission is required to release official results by May 22.

Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim-majority nation, is an outpost of democracy in a Southeast Asian neighborhood of authoritarian governments and is forecast to be among the world’s biggest economies by 2030. A second term for Widodo, the first Indonesian president from outside the Jakarta elite, could further cement the country’s two decades of democratization.

Subianto, a strident nationalist, ran a fear-based campaign, highlighting what he sees as Indonesia’s weakness and the risk of exploitation by foreign powers or disintegration.

Widodo said he had sent a representative to talk to Subianto and his camp.

“This afternoon I have sent an envoy to meet Prabowo to set a meeting, and if people see our meeting, we will be able to show how the elections have ended smoothly, safely and peacefully,” he said.

The country’s security minister and its military and police chiefs said earlier Thursday that they will crack down on any attempts to disrupt public order while official results from presidential and legislative elections are tabulated.

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