Legislative in Mali: the second round did not mobilize

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In Mali, the second round of legislative elections took place this Sunday, despite the coronavirus pandemic and insecurity. A ballot to elect 125 of the 147 deputies in the National Assembly, the others having won their seats in the first round. Attendance was low in the capital and inside Mali, several polling stations also remained closed. 

Publicity

With our correspondents in Bamako, Coralie Pierret and Serge Daniel 

Polling stations in Mali have closed since 6 p.m. (GMT). The day was disrupted by the Covid-19 pandemic. Some voters say they made the trip by " civic duty ". " By taking all the necessary precautions ", specifies a voter, mask on the nose. The assembly had to be renewed since 2018 and " the mandate of deputies has now expired, " said a second voter. Others have today chosen to abstain. With them, the misunderstanding remains intact. "Why did you maintain this second round? Some question.

This morning, masks were distributed in some polling stations. While in others, there was only one hand washing station. According to Cocem, a coalition of independent observers, the protection measures were reinforced in the second round. With a flat all the same: " all the crucial measures have not been taken into account everywhere ", we read in a midday release. 

So has this pandemic scared the Bamakois who want to go to the polls? The big unknown of the day remains participation. If traditionally, the legislative elections in Mali mobilize relatively little, the estimates of participation in the second round are not yet known.

And inside the country ... 

Inside Mali, the voters moved with no senator to go to vote this Sunday. These are deputies whom we had to elect ... No people in front of the polling stations. But generally the electoral material was on the spot, according to witnesses. No vote in electoral districts of the center and the north of the country either because the electoral material was destroyed - it is the case of the locality of Gossi, located in the region of Timbuktu -, or because of the presence of jihadists who prevented the arrival of electoral materials on the spot. 

The practice of buying votes denounced by national observers in the regions of Sikasso in the south and Kayes in the west. And even in a voting center in Mopti in the center. Further north, in a polling station in the locality of Diré, supporters of competing lists used firearms. Finally, the sanitary kits supplied by the Malian Ministry of Health to fight coronavirus disease were inside Mali, more present in the voting centers than during the first round.

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