Indonesian Constitutional Court overturned challenges for Prabowo SubiantoTrump’s victory in the country’s presidential elections, but did not prohibit his electoral rivals from running for president again, contrary to claims made in an edited video seen hundreds of thousands of times on social media. Live footage of the constitutional court ruling shows that the judges did not ban Prabowo’s rivals and the court’s written rulings also make no mention of an alleged ban.
“Ganjar Pranowo and Anies Baswedan are banned by the Constitutional Court from running for president in Indonesia never“, read the Indonesian text on a TikTok Video shared on April 23, 2024
The video, which has more than 450,000 viewscombines clips of the presidential candidates and their running mates reacting to a court ruling.
One of the court’s judges appears to say that the candidates – referring to them by their candidate numbers – are “not allowed to run in Indonesia’s presidential elections.” never“.
The video was also posted elsewhere on TikTok here It is hereas well as in Facebook, YouTube and video sharing platform SnackVideoaccumulating more than 18.6 million views in total.
It was shared the day after Indonesia’s constitutional court rejected challenges to Prabowo’s victory brought by his two main rivals, who alleged state interference and rule changes that supported his ticket.
Anies and Ganjar filed lawsuits in March 2024, requiring a repeat of the February 2024 election – in which Prabowo won almost 60 percent of the vote.
Following the court’s ruling, Indonesia’s electoral commission formally declared Prabowo the next president of the country.
But the constitutional court also did not prohibit Anies and Ganjar from running for president again.
Court decisions
A keyword search on YouTube resulted in Live broadcast of the Constitutional Court’s decision, published on the official channel of the local broadcaster Kompas TV on April 22 (archived link).
The clip of Anies and his running mate Muhaimin Iskandar corresponds to the Mark 4:24:43 from the Kompas TV video.
The clip of Ganjar and his running mate Mahfud MD matches the footage shown in the video Mark 4:52:21.
Below is a screenshot comparison from the fake post (left) and the Kompas TV footage (top and bottom right):
Some of the audio heard in the fake TikTok video was taken between the 4:50:48 and 4:51:13 marks of the Kompas TV footage.
It then jumps to the audio used between the 4:51:29 and 4:51:42 marks of the Kompas TV video.
This audio is from constitutional judge Arsul Sani explaining why the court is rejecting Anies and Ganjar’s challenges over alleged violations of election campaign rules.
The fake post then inserts the voice of someone imitating a judge, saying that Anies and Ganjar were now banned from running for president again.
But at no point in the live footage broadcast on Kompas TV did a judge “ban” Anies and Ganjar.
The court’s written decisions here It is here it also makes no mention that Anies and Ganjar were banned from running for the top job again (archived links here It is here).
AFP has debunked other false claims related to the 2024 Indonesian elections here.
