Togo: kick-off of the presidential campaign

Text by: Pierre Firtion Follow

The official campaign for the Togolese presidential election begins this Thursday for two weeks. In power since 2005, Faure Gnassingbé is a candidate for a fourth term. For this ballot, now with two rounds and open to the diaspora, six candidates face the outgoing president. Jean-Pierre Fabre, the leader of the ANC and Agbéyomé Kodjo, the former Prime Minister of Gnassingbé Eyadema, are notably in the running.

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We left for two weeks of an intense marathon. Between field visits, meetings, radio and TV broadcasts, the program of the various candidates promises to be loaded. There are seven in total on the starting line. Starting with the President-in-Office.

Why does Faure Gnassingbé represent himself after fifteen years of power? " He has gradually reconstructed the country politically ," Christian Trimua, the Minister of Human Rights, explained on Tuesday, making all the necessary constitutional and institutional reforms. He has, economically, revived the dynamics of development of the country, and then tackled the important social project of social reconstruction of the country. His results speak for him . ” If the number of mandates is now limited to two, the measure adopted last May by a constitutional reform is not retroactive. Faure Gnassingbé was therefore able to represent himself, which some of his opponents keep denouncing.

Jean-Pierre Fabre is one of them. The ANC leader filed an appeal on January 27 to have his candidacy invalidated. An appeal dismissed by the Constitutional Court. The former opposition leader does not intend to stop there: on RFI, he announced Wednesday his intention to introduce a new claim before the Court of Justice of the ECOWAS. At the same time, Jean-Pierre Fabre, who came second in the last two presidential elections, intends to conduct an intense field campaign. After the ANC has mainly trained its future representatives in the polling stations in recent weeks, the candidate is leaving him this Thursday for Dapaong to hold a first meeting there.

The challenge for the opposition? Mobilize your electorate

Also in the running for the ballot, Agbéyomé Kodjo also intends to cross the entire territory, " from Lomé to Cinkassé (small town located on the border with Burkina Faso) ", specifies Fulbert Attisso, the general coordinator of his campaign. Invested only on December 31, the former Prime Minister of Gnassingbé Eyadéma has recently started to "introduce himself" to the population, whether on the markets of Lomé or in the interior of the country. At the head of the MPDD (Patriotic Movement for Development and Democracy), he is a candidate for the second time in the supreme magistracy after the election of 2010 where he had obtained 0.9% of the votes.

This election will also be the second lap for Aimé Gogue and Mohamed Tchassona Traoré. Patron of ADDI (Democratic Alliance for Integral Development), the first had 4.3% of the vote in 2015 against 0.9% for the second, at the head of the MCD (Citizen Movement for Democracy and Development) . The last two candidates are C14 alumni: Georges-William Kouessan will represent the People's Health Party and Komi Wolou the Socialist Party for Renewal (PSR).

Can one of these candidates hope to bring down the irremovable Faure Gnassingbé? The bet looks all the more complicated as the opposition presents itself divided. Not to mention that certain figures also call for a boycott of the ballot like Tikpi Atcham, the leader of the PNP. The challenge for the candidates in the running will therefore be to succeed in mobilizing an electorate potentially tempted by abstention. To do this, opponents should be able to count on Togo-Debout. This Citizen Front, which brings together some twenty civil society organizations, does not currently plan to call for a boycott of the elections. " I think we will support this process to the end and see what we can get out of it, " predicts David Dosseh , the structure's first spokesperson.

Opposition demands rejected by the authorities

But worried about the lack of transparency, the Citizen Front, like most opposition candidates, is constantly calling on the authorities to review the system planned for the ballot. Their requests? Not only that the results are published polling station by polling station but that the composition of the CENI is reviewed. Civil society and opponents are also surprised that the Justice & Peace Episcopal Council was not authorized to observe the poll. The Conference of Bishops of Togo emerged Tuesday from its silence to denounce this decision. In a press release, the prelates "challenge the allegations made by the Minister of Territorial Administration" to justify his refusal, "such a right having been exercised many times in the past by the said Episcopal Council".

Will the government then accede to the requests made by the candidates and civil society? Nothing is less sure. Christian Trimua, the Minister of Human Rights, rejected the idea of ​​a polling station by polling station on Tuesday because, according to him, " the Togolese electoral system provides for a first centralization of the results at the level of independent local electoral commissions, which then refer them to the National Commission in Lomé ”. Same end of inadmissibility regarding the reorganization of the CENI. " It cannot be renewed ", because he believes, " it is composed on the basis of representation in the National Assembly and not on the results of local elections ".

We are desperate. We want the promises to come true. There are promises versus promises ...

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