Guinea-Bissau – Presidential election 1st round

The first round of the presidential election in Guinea-Bissau was held on Sunday 28 June. The election was held following the assassination of President Vieira in March.

The run up to the election was very difficult. At the beginning of June, there was an attempted coup, or at least events were portrayed by the government as such. A number of people, including a former prime minister, Faustino Fudut Embali, a former Defence minister, and a serving minister and presidential candidate, Baciro Dabo, were killed. There was some talk of delaying the poll, but it went ahead as planned and election observer reports suggest that it was held freely and fairly.

I have not been able to obtain the full list of results, but the essentials are available. As expected, Malan Bacai Sanhá, the candidate for the ruling PAIGC party, topped the poll with 39.59%. The other candidate in the second round will be former president, Kumba Ialá, who won 29.42%. These two were also the candidates at the second round of the 2000 presidential election when Ialá won. At that election, Ialá won 38.8% at the first ballot and Sanhá won 23.4%. So, Sanhá is much better placed this time.

The third-placed candidate was the independent, Henrique Pereira Rosa, who won 24.19%. According to reports, he has not pledged his support either candidate at least yet. All of the other candidates were well behind. I have a report that the fourth candidate was Yaia Djaló of the Partido Nova Democracia who won 3.11%. I have no scores for any of the seven other candidates.

The turnout was 60%, which was low by Guinea-Bissau standards.

The second round will take place on either 26 July or, more likely, 2 August.

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