Headlines: a look back at Faure Gnassingbé's big victory

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By: Frédéric Couteau Follow

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" No suspense was planned, there was none ," notes Le Monde Afrique . Faure Gnassingbé was therefore re-elected for a fourth term as head of Togo, yesterday Monday, the day after an election which had taken place without major incident. Around two in the morning, the CENI, the National and Independent Electoral Commission, announced that the candidate for the Union for the Republic party, which has ruled Togo for fifteen years, had obtained an absolute majority (72.3%) before the opposing Agboyémé Kodjo (18.3%). "

“ What has marked most Togolese , for its part , notes the information site Ici Lomé , is the fact that the CENI announced the provisional results of the poll only 24 hours after it was held.
It is indeed the first time in the history of Togo that the CENI has announced the provisional results of the elections so early. Before, we had to wait days to know the results. It is a feat. But it remains to be seen whether these results are consistent with the voices cast in the ballot boxes. "

A suspicious score ?

The Burkinabé daily Le Pays clearly expresses its doubts ... “ The CENI's eagerness to proclaim the victory of President Faure Gnassingbé, at a late hour which has taken more than one short, may seem suspect. Was it really able, in such a short time, to centralize all the results as it should be? , wonders Le Pays . It is to be wondered if these are not laboratory results and if their proclamation, in an emergency, was not rather aimed at short-circuiting the opposition candidate Agbéyomé Kodjo who, a few hours before, already claimed the victory, given the figures he said he had. As if the government wanted to avoid being ousted, in a mad race where everyone wanted to take the lead. "

Observer Paalga , still in Burkina , is not as affirmative ... " Did the Togolese regime really need massive and organized fraud to keep their things ?" We can reasonably doubt it : firstly because there is always the famous outgoing bonus, especially when it is based on undeniable socioeconomic gains according to many observers; to this is added the incapacity of the opposition to unite against the common adversary. "

Explainable ?

In any case, it is true that the score of the outgoing president, almost three-quarters of the votes in the first round, can be described as " Soviet ". This is what Le Monde Afrique points to . Le Monde Afrique which explains this magnitude " by a fracture within the opposition, but also by a widening of the electoral base of Faure Gnassingbé, traditionally composed of the Kabiye ethnic group, from the Kara region, about 450 km north of Lomé. "It is a plebiscite," said Gilbert Barawa, Minister of the Public Service. However, these results are already controversial , notes Le Monde Afrique. Civil society has identified ballot box stuffing and results reversals. "

For its part, points out the Togo Breaking News site , “ the ECOWAS electoral observation mission in Togo noted that the Togolese electoral process had taken place without major incident. Observers from the community organization praised the good citizenship and the tolerance of the Togolese voters. "

Work to be done…

For the official Togolese Republic website , now, “ the hardest part begins. Faure Gnassingbé must implement everything he promised during the campaign. (…) The reforms undertaken by the Togolese authorities and the improvement of the business climate have enabled Togo to be among the most reforming countries in the world. "However, recognizes the site," poverty remains far too high in the country. "And the Togolese Republic concludes:" despite its good macroeconomic results, Togo still faces major structural weaknesses such as access to electricity, water, basic education and even youth employment . The National Development Program adopted by the government last March must give priority to tackling these essential areas for the well-being of local populations. "

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