Jakarta – The Constitutional Court unanimously dismissed on Wednesday the complaints of Megawati Soekarnoputri and Vice President Jusuf Kalla over the July 8 election.

Both Megawati of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle and Kalla of Golkar Party gave it a final shot to push for a second round of the election, filing a lawsuit with the court immediately after election organizer, the General Elections Commission (KPU), declared Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono's landslide victory with 60.8 percent of votes.

Presiding judge Mohammad Mahfud MD told a hearing at the court's office in Jakarta that Megawati's and Kalla's claims that the commission had committed violations and fraud, in turn costing them a large number of votes "lack a legal basis".

"We found no systematic, structural and massive violations on the General Elections Commission's part. As a consequence, the election was not void or illegal." He also said the plaintiffs had failed to provide sufficient evidence to prove their allegations that the commission had manipulated the election result.

"[The commission] did commit various violations regarding the registration of eligible voters. However, the electoral roll fiasco did not significantly change the result of the election."

Alleged criminal violations and other violations in the election could still be investigated but would not alter the result of the election, he added.

Kalla's team had later filed a lawsuit calling for the election to be annulled after alleging that there were 47 million errors on the electoral roll including duplicate names. It also said a decision to close 69,000 polling stations had prevented 34.5 million people from voting.

Megawati's legal team had alleged that 28 million votes had been miscounted for a variety of reasons and incorrectly given to SBY, meaning a second voting round was required.

The court's ruling, according to Refly Harun, an expert from of the Center for Electoral Reforms, "was appropriate". He said it was hard for the plaintiffs to prove their claims that there had been a discrepancy of millions of votes in the commission's recap.

"To push for a second round, the votes for Yudhoyono, which reached 60.8 percent, must be reduced to 50 percent; that's cutting 11 to 12 millions votes. To prove that, they had to present mountains of evidence, and even doing that does not make the evidence solid," he told The Jakarta Post.

Based on the result issued by the commission, Megawati came second in the election with 26.79 percent of votes, while Kalla trailed behind with 12.41 percent.

"It's also hard to prove if any violations or fraud conducted by the commission had affected the result," Refly said.

He, however, added it was undeniable that the commission had committed violations in organizing the electoral roll, and that it had taken sides to some extent.

"But the violations were not massive. It's exaggerating to say that the violations had been organized by a single power when we have three candidates competing in the election.

"The Constitutional Court, however, has no authority to sanction the commission. It's the duty of the election watchdog, the police, the House of Representatives, or the president."

The losing candidates' decision to contest the election result, Refly said, was "extraordinary".

"Election results are not supposed to be settled in court rooms; they must be settled through the process of the elections themselves." (adh)

Constitutional Court ruling in presidential election dispute

• The General Elections Commission did commit various procedural faults, but these were not structured, systematic or massive violations. The faults were technical in nature and did not make the election void or invalid.
• Future elections need more professional organization, both in the drafting of laws and in carrying out the commission's duties.
• While the violations conducted in the election did not significantly affect the result, they are subject to further legal actions.
• Megawati and Kalla's claims of vote discrepancies were based on assumptions and were not supported by solid evidence.