MALE // The Maldives 30-year incumbent leader is ahead in the islands' first multiparty presidential election, according to preliminary results today in a poll marred by rigging charges and delays. Polling closed this morning ? some 12 hours behind schedule ? and shortly afterwards the election commission said the president Maumoon Abdul Gayoom had 40.6 per cent of the 208,252 votes counted.
The election in the Maldives is the culmination of years of agitation for democratic reforms which Mr Gayoom, 71, finally signed into law in August. One of the chief agitators for those reforms, Mohamed Nasheed, was in second place with 25.1 per cent. Mr Nasheed, known as Anni, was jailed repeatedly by Asia's longest-serving leader on what rights groups said were trumped-up charges.
"We will try to have the final result at 11.30pm [local time]. Voting is no longer going on. Counting is going on," said the elections commissioner Mohamed Ibrahim. The commission said it had no turnout figures for the 208,252 registered voters, but had verified 68 per cent of the 396 ballot boxes. But given the wide disparity in the size of polling stations spread over 200 inhabited islands and a few luxury resort islands it was hard to gain a clear picture, the board said.
If no one gets 50 per cent of the vote, it will go to a deciding vote, due within 10 days. Just a few hours after polling opened yesterday, voters complained of missing registrations or ink that was supposed to be indelible washing off the hands of those who had voted. After an emergency meeting, the electoral board said anyone with an ID card could vote, prompted three opposition challengers to declare the poll would be subject to fraud and double-voting.
But Mr Nasheed said the problems were too minor to affect the vote. The decision to open up voting led the polls, which had been due to end at 8pm local time yesterday, to drag into this morning. Many Maldivians had expected vote-rigging and bribery. Despite some minor threats in the final days of campaigning, the polling went peacefully amid a heavy security presence. Mr Gayoom is seeking a seventh term running the island nation of 300,000 mainly Sunni Muslims, which in the past he has been accused of ruling like a sultanate.
That form of government was abolished on the islands, located 800km off the tip of India, 40 years ago. Mr Gayoom drew international criticism after a heavy-handed offensive on pro-democracy protesters, which eventually led to his signing into law last month a new constitution that established an independent judiciary and electoral body. It also abolished the old style of voting for president, where a parliament-approved candidate stood in a yes-no referendum that Gayoom won six times.
*Reuters