Central African Republic President Faustin-Archange Touadera has won a third term in office, securing an outright majority in the presidential election held on December 28, provisional results from the electoral commission showed on Monday.<\/p>\n
The\u00a068-year-old mathematician who took power a decade ago was seeking a third term after a constitutional referendum in 2023 scrapped the presidential term limit.<\/p>\n
He campaigned on his security record in the chronically unstable nation after enlisting help from Russian mercenaries and Rwandan soldiers. He also signed peace deals with several rebel groups this year.<\/p>\n
The results announced on Monday night by Mathias Morouba, the country’s top election official, showed Touadera received 76.15% of the vote, while former prime minister Anicet-Georges Dologuele received 14.66% and former prime minister Henri-Marie Dondra received 3.19%.<\/p>\n
Voter turnout was 52.42%, Morouba said.<\/p>\n
The main opposition coalition, known by its French acronym BRDC, boycotted the election, saying it would not be fair.<\/p>\n
Even before the results were announced, Dologuele and Dondra had cast doubt on their credibility, calling separate press conferences to denounce what they described as election fraud.<\/p>\n
Dologuele, the runner-up in the 2020 election, told a press conference on Friday that there had been “a methodical attempt to manipulate” the outcome.<\/p>\n
“The Central African people spoke on December 28,” Dologuele said. “They expressed a clear desire for change.”<\/p>\n
Touadera’s government has denied any fraud took place.<\/p>\n
The Constitutional Court has until January 20 to adjudicate any challenges and declare definitive results.<\/p>\n
Touadera to Stay in Power<\/strong><\/p>\n Touadera’s victory will likely further the interests of Russia, which has traded security assistance for access to resources including gold and diamonds.<\/p>\n But Touadera has also signalled a renewed interest in Western partnerships, saying he would welcome any country willing to develop CAR’s lithium, uranium and gold reserves.<\/p>\n Opposition groups have said the 2023 referendum that allowed him to extend his rule into a second decade was proof he wants to be president for life.<\/p>\n There were no reports of major disturbances during the voting on December 28, a far cry from the last election in 2020, when rebel groups prevented hundreds of polling stations from opening.<\/p>\n But analysts warn Touadera’s security gains remain fragile.<\/p>\n “Armed groups have not disappeared. They have just been incorporated into the system,” said Nathalia Dukhan, Central Africa analyst for the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime.<\/p>\n Some leaders of armed groups have received government jobs after signing peace deals with Touadera, Dukhan said.<\/p>\n “But if they see that the system is not serving their interest, things could take a dramatic turn,” she added.<\/p>\n Touadera’s control over state institutions and superior financial resources made him the favourite ahead of voting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Central African Republic President Faustin-Archange Touadera has won a third term in office, securing an outright majority in the presidential election held on December 28, provisional results from the electoral commission showed on Monday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19192,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":0,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","source_name":"Reuters","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,2362,33],"tags":[1134,1137],"class_list":["post-19191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-central-africa","category-featured","category-politics","tag-central-african-republic","tag-faustin-archange-touadera"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19191"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19194,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19191\/revisions\/19194"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19192"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qiraatafrican.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}