The Madagascan President Andry Rajoelina has won a second-term in office in the first round of a ballot spurned by almost all the opposition candidates, according to the electoral commission on Saturday, November 25.
According to the results presented by the poll body which still needs to be validated by the Constitutional Court, Rajoelina won 58.95 percent of the total votes cast in the November 16 presidential election.
The voter turnout was just over 46 percent, a reduced number when compared to the previous presidential election in 2018, and the the election commission has blamed this on “ambient political climate” and “manipulation of opinion”.
Rajoelina first came into power in 2009 after a mutiny that overthrew the then president, Marc Ravalomanana. He thereafter skipped the following elections only to make a winning comeback in 2018.
The 11 million voters had to pick between Rajeolina and 12 other candidates. Ten of the incumbent’s rivals refused to campaign and urged voters to shun the ballot, labelling it a sham.
Rajoelina, an ex-mayor of the capital Antananarivo, is being accused by rivals of greed, corruption, and turning a blind eye to the looting of the country’s natural resources, including its precious rosewood forests.
“We will not recognise the results of this illegal election, pockmarked with irregularities, and we turn down all responsibility for the political and social instability that could ensue,” the opponents had warned.
