Maputo — Daniel Chapo, the presidential candidate of Mozambique’s ruling celebration, is comfortably leading the vote count in 9 of the country’s provinces and seems quandary to became the country’s subsequent president. His closest challenger became operating a miles away 2d Wednesday as vote counting from remaining week’s election persisted.
Preliminary results from Wednesday’s election announced to this point show Chapo leading with over 50% of the vote in 9 of Mozambique’s 11 provinces.
In the capital, Maputo, Chapo is forward with over 53 percent, adopted by self sustaining candidate Venancio Mondlane at merely below 34 percent.
Chapo has led at every polling role counted, in accordance with the chairperson of the Maputo Provincial Election Commission, Lucilia Sitoe.
She said, “Daniel Franscisco Chapo, 656,056, which corresponds to 68.02. Venancio Antion Bila Mondlane, 260,792, which corresponds to 27.04%.”
The two other presidential candidates, Ossufo Momade of the opposition Renamo celebration, polled 9.6% of the vote in Maputo, adopted by Lutero Simango of Mozambique Democratic Stream, MDM with 2.86%.
A identical discipline is also going down in the central province of Zambezia, historically an opposition stronghold. There, Chapo is leading with 73%, with Mondlane a miles away 2d with 14.7%.
In Sofala province, one other longtime opposition stronghold, Chapo held 65% of the vote.
Turnout in Wednesday’s election became somewhat low, decrease than 50%. In accordance to knowledge shared by electoral our bodies, shut to 9 million of Mozambique’s 17 million registered voters didn’t vote.
In the northern province of Nampula, the biggest constituency in the country, more than 2 million voters stayed home and tens of hundreds forged easy ballots – a unusual form of disclose in Mozambique, showing dissatisfaction with the entire candidates.
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The numbers were identical in Zambezia, the country’s 2d-biggest constituency.
In Cabo Delgado province, tormented by an insurgency by Islamist militants for several years, 925,000 of us didn’t vote, 35,000 forged easy ballots and one other 18,000 votes were unsuitable.
The chairman of Mozambique’s nationwide elections charge vowed that every ballotforged might be counted.
He said, “Every vote will be counted definitely, we are ready for that. The counting system is participatory because all the political parties are represented at polling stations so every vote will count and we just hope for the best.”
Closing results are expected in about two weeks. Independent political analyst Dercio Alfazema said the following president faces high expectations from the general public.
“Our expectations are number one, is to be well governed, so we have a challenge to obtain a better result, the people want the end of corruption, we are looking for more security, we are looking for more health service and the quality of education, the extension of the services such as infrastructure. We also have the problem of terrorism in the north, the kidnappings; the young people are looking for jobs and some opportunities,” said Alfazema.
The president-elect might be sworn into quandary of business in January, when most modern President Filipe Nyusi, who is barred by the constitution from operating again, steps down at the stop of his 2d 5-year period of time.
Mariama Diallo, VOA’s Nairobi bureau chief, contributed to this memoir.
