Bashir poised to win Sudanese election

April 20, 2010 - 0:0

KHARTOUM (Agencies) -- Sudanese President Umar Hassan al-Bashir has secured huge victories in the country's landmark multi-party general elections, media reports say.

The state-owned Suna news agency announced on Sunday that the incumbent president has won between 70 and 92 percent of votes cast in the April 11 ballots for presidency.
Sudan's election authorities have also said that all of 17 state assembly seats from north Sudan have gone to Bashir's National Congress Party.
Sudan's national election commission said on Monday that results from the country's first multi-party election in 24 years, originally expected on Tuesday, would be delayed.
“We cannot set a definite date to announce the results because (the counting) is a very complicated process,” the head the NEC's technical committee Hadi Mohammed Ahmed told AFP.
Election results had been expected on Tuesday but the NEC then suggested later dates.
“We had hoped to reveal the final results by April 21, but we are not in a position to do that,” Ahmed said.
The Sudanese people had five days to vote for their president as well as legislative and local representatives in the country's first multi-party election since 1986 which ended on Thursday.
Since the end of the election, in which southerners also voted for the leader of their semi-autonomous government, the NEC has been announcing the results of the legislative polls as they become available.
So far Bashir's National Congress Party is sweeping the boards.
A significant part of the opposition had boycotted the election, accusing Bashir's ruling National Congress Party of rigging the election, which was marred by delays and logistical problems.
International observers from the Carter Centre and the European Union said on Saturday that the polls had failed to reach international standards.
Photo: Sudan's President Umar Hassan al-Bashir (C) gestures after casting his ballot at a polling station in Khartoum April 11, 2010. (Reuters photo)
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