Congo-Brazzaville’s 82-year-old President Denis Sassou Nguesso secured 95 percent of the vote in an election that extended his rule, the constitutional court said late Saturday.
The March 15 election gave Sassou Nguesso, who has led the oil-rich central African country for four decades, a new five year term.
“Denis Sassou Nguesso won an absolute majority and is elected president with 94.9 percent of votes on a turnout of 65.9 percent,” the head of the court, Auguste Iloki, told a public hearing.
The opposition has challenged every election won by Sassou-Nguesso.
Dave Mafoula, one of six candidates who stood against him, formally asked for the election to be declared nul and void but the court rejected the demand.
Sassou Nguesso first led Congo-Brazzaville under a one-party system from 1979 to 1992 before losing the country’s first multi-party elections. He overthrew the winner in 1997 in a civil war.
Since 2002, he has been re-elected five times in votes the opposition has said were neither transparent nor democratic.
The former paratrooper colonel is one of Africa’s longest-serving leaders, along with Equatorial Guinea’s Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo and Cameroon’s President Paul Biya.
While he can claim to have brought some stability to the country, rights groups regularly accuse him of persecuting opposition activists.
Two challengers from the 2016 election are serving 20-year jail terms for being a “threat internal security”.
The constitution forbids Sassou Nguesso from standing again in 2031, once his fifth term ends.
