Jakarta. Raden Gani Muhammad, the acting mayor of Bekasi, testified before the Constitutional Court on Thursday to dismiss allegations that he and fellow regional leaders had been instructed to sway voters for presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto.

Gani was presented as a witness by the Prabowo legal team to counter allegations of voter fraud brought by defeated candidates Anies Baswedan and Ganjar Pranowo.

Prabowo was declared the elected president by winning 58.58 percent of the vote during the official announcement by the General Election Commission (KPU) on March 20.

"As the acting mayor of Bekasi, allow me to underline here that I have never received any instruction from my superiors to take a side or influence voters for a certain candidate," Gani said during the court hearing in Jakarta.

Even if such an instruction did exist, he stated that he wouldn’t have had enough time to persuade all his subordinates at the district level and below to comply.

Gani was appointed as the acting mayor on September 20 last year, merely a month before all three presidential candidates, including Prabowo, officially registered themselves with the KPU.

Anies and Ganjar have alleged that the government sought help from appointed regional leaders to ensure Prabowo’s victory. The defense minister teamed up with Gibran Rakabuming Raka, the eldest son of President Joko Widodo, as his running mate.

Many governors, mayors, and regents have ended their terms before the simultaneous local elections are held this November. The president and the home affairs minister appointed bureaucrats as interim leaders to prevent the vacuum of power in many provinces and cities.

The presence of many appointed leaders rather than elected governors or mayors gave the government the ability to influence voters at the provincial level or below, as Anies and Ganjar have alleged.

However, Gani argued that shaping the political preferences of his subordinates against their will is an impossible task, noting that Bekasi alone has roughly 11,000 civil servants.

“That’s a huge number, and it won’t be easy to influence them for a certain candidate,” the mayor said.

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