[ad_1]
NOUAKCHOT, Mauritania — Mauritania’s incumbent President Mohamed Ould Cheikh El Ghazouani easily won re-election as leader of the vast desert country seen as a cornerstone of relative stability in Africa’s volatile Sahel region.
The former army chief won more than 56 percent of the vote, the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI) said on Monday, which would give him a second five-year term, during which Mauritania would become a natural gas producer.
Dozens of supporters gathered outside Ghazouani’s campaign headquarters in the capital, Nouakchott, after the final provisional results of Saturday’s election were announced.
“I don’t know how to express my joy,” said Bekuma Mohammed, 56. “Our president is a great president. We are very happy.”
The results must be sent to the Constitutional Council for confirmation within 48 hours.
Ghazouani is the favorite to win, but if he does not get more than half of the votes he will face a runoff.
In fact, he performed well ahead of his main rival, anti-slavery activist Biram Dah Abeid, who received just over 22 percent of the vote.
Abed had previously said he would not accept CENI’s election results, but on Monday he denounced the election as “massive fraud” and said he was waiting for his own team to announce the results before launching possible street demonstrations.
“Any protests you have must be peaceful,” he told supporters, according to his campaign’s social media accounts.
On Sunday evening, some of Abed’s supporters burned tires and disrupted traffic in Nouakchott, and a spokesman said Abed’s campaign manager had been arrested.
Later that evening, the police presence in the capital was significantly increased.
mauritania
The interior minister warned late on Sunday that he would “not tolerate any actions that could disturb the peace and tranquility of our citizens and residents.”
The 2019 elections that brought Gazuani to power marked Tanzania’s first transition between two democratically elected presidents since independence from France in 1960 and a series of coups between 1978 and 2008.
Despite a series of military coups and escalating jihadism in the Sahel in recent years, particularly in Mali, Mauritania has not been attacked since 2011.
Ghazouani, 67, is widely regarded as the mastermind behind the West African country’s relative safety.
Overall turnout on Saturday was 55.39%, lower than in 2019.
The election results have been coming in since Saturday evening and have been continuously published by CENI on the official online platform as a transparency measure to indicate the final outcome.
“We did everything we could to create conditions for smooth elections, and we were relatively successful,” said Daher Ould Abdel Jelil, chairman of the electoral commission, in announcing the results on Monday.
Ghazouani’s other main rival, Islamist Twasur party leader Hamadi Ould Sid El Mokhtar, came in third with 12.8 percent, according to CENI.
Ghazouani has made helping young people a priority in a country of 4.9 million where nearly three-quarters of the population are under 35.
After a first term marred by the coronavirus pandemic and the war in Ukraine, the incumbent president said he hopes to take advantage of good economic prospects to carry out more reforms.
The World Bank said growth should average 4.9% (3.1% per capita) between 2024 and 2026, boosted by gas production in the second half of this year.
Inflation has fallen from a peak of 9.5% in 2022 to 5% in 2023 and will continue to slow to 2.5% in 2024.
[ad_2]
Source link
