Brazzaville – Voters in the Republic of Congo voted on Sunday to choose 50 candidates in 25 constituencies in a second round of legislative elections.
Officials began counting the papers as soon as voting ended at 18:00 (1700 GMT).
Voting took place without any major incident in all of the 1 000 polling stations open across the country, said Henri Bouka, head of the electoral commission.
Opposition groups in the country, which is also known as Congo-Brazzaville, had denounced the results of the first round as fraudulent.
The Congolese Labour Party (PCT) of President Denis Sassou Nguesso won the first round of voting on July 10, taking 102 of the 151 seats in the national assembly.
It still has 14 candidates in run-off votes.
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The PCT is followed by the Pan-African Union for Social Democracy (UPADS), the main opposition force, which has four deputies and four of its candidates are in the run-off.
The Union of Humanist Democrats (UDH-Yuki) of the late opposition leader Guy-Brice Parfait Kolelas was able to get three candidates elected in the first round and seven others competed this Sunday.
At the Alphonse Massamba-Debat primary school with 18 voting booths, the first voter had been registered at 7:31 am (0631 GMT).
“It’s going well, calmly. I have asked my colleagues that the vote should take place calmly, transparently and with vigilance,” Brunelle Bodo, the head of one polling station, told AFP earlier Sunday.
There were some signs of logistical challenges with some stations opening late including three at the primary school in Moukondo, in the fourth district.
Bouka had urged Saturday the candidates and their supporters to remain calm.
The date for the release of the results has not yet been set.
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Source: AFP
Picture: Pexels
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