Togo calm after counting

2005-04-25 13:27

Lome - Vote counting was complete and calm was restored here on Monday after a violence-marred presidential election left three dead amid claims from both Togo's main parties of massive fraud.

An official of the national electoral commission said results would not be announced before Tuesday, as only 14 percent of returns had been received from the local commissions.

Reports of stolen and burned ballot boxes and a series of fraud attempts were the spark that ignited the already tense atmosphere after voters turned out in force on Sunday to elect a successor to Gnassingbe Eyadema.

Voters had a choice essentially between the Rally of the Togolese People (RPT) candidate Faure Gnassingbe, 39-year-old son of the late leader, and his main challenger Emmanuel Akitani Bob, 74, representing a radical opposition coalition, the Union of Forces for Change (UFC).

An uneasy calm returned on Monday to the Be neighbourhood, an opposition stronghold which was the scene of much of the violence, as police patrolled streets still strewn with the remains of makeshift barricades.

Peaceful and credible

Hospital and diplomatic sources put the death toll at three with 20 injured, some with bullet wounds.

Ahead of the worst of the violence the UN Secretary General Kofi Annan praised Togolese voters for their high and peaceful turnout and reiterated support "for the important facilitation role played by the Economic Community of West African States (Ecowas) in helping Togo organize a peaceful and credible poll."

"As the population awaits the official results, the secretary general appeals once again for calm and urges the parties to refer any electoral disputes to the appropriate authorities as provided for in the electoral code," the statement read.

Former French junior minister for integration Kofi Yamgnane, who also holds Togolese nationality, was critical of Paris's silence over the violence and called on the Togolese army for restraint.

"Togo must not become another Ivory Coast," he said.

"I make a solemn call to the Togolese military to refuse to use their arms against their brothers and sisters," he added.

French daily Le Figaro reported on Monday its reporter had been sent back to Paris shortly after arriving in Lome on Friday because he lacked accreditation.

Overnight on Sunday tensions ran high in areas of the tiny west African state's capital, where opposition supporters wielding machetes erected barricades to protest alleged irregularities.

- AFP