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Calls to anull Mozambique vote

Location: Mozambique. Posted on Fri, 13th Nov 2009.

Armando Guebuza won the presidency but his rivals are calling for a new election [Reuters]

Mozambique's main opposition party has called for the results of the country's recent presidential election to be annulled, saying the vote was rigged.

Incumbent president, Armando Guebuza, who has been in power since 2005, won the October poll by a landslide securing 75 per cent of the vote, according to results announced earlier this week.

His Frelimo party, in power since it led the country to independence from Portugal in 1975, won 191 parliamentary seats out of 250.

But according to local media the main opposition Renamo party now claims it has evidence of widespread vote-rigging.

"We demand the cancellation of the results that were just announced and we insist on a new vote," Ussufo Momade, the Renamo secretary-general, was quoted as saying on Thursday.

Renamo has alleged ballot-stuffing in some districts and that its observers had been expelled from others.

The breakaway Democratic Movement of Mozambique, which came in third in the October 28 poll, also protested saying ballots had been tampered with at some polling stations.

Voter turnout nationwide was 45 per cent, but some stations reported a turnout of 95 per cent or more, raising suspicion of possible ballot stuffing.

The vote was Mozambique's fourth national election since a 16-year civil war between Renamo and the Frelimo government ended in the establishment of multi-party democracy in 1994.

Al Jazeera

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