Elections in the Central African Republic: contrasted voting day
The counting operations have started in Bangui.
© RFI / Gaël Grilhot
Text by: RFI Follow
3 min
The polling stations are gradually closing their doors in the Central African Republic and the counting has started, especially in Bangui.
The ballot was generally calm in Bangui, the capital, but the situation was more mixed in the provinces.
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With our special correspondent in Bangui,
Florence Morice
In total, some 1.8 million Central Africans
were called upon to elect their new president and their deputies.
But
the armed groups
, which for several days have been leading an offensive against the ballot, have disrupted the vote in many localities.
There are even places where voters could not go to the polls.
The situation was very contrasted this Sunday between the interior of the country and the capital Bangui, where the vote was generally held in peace and where the concerns expressed by some this morning after sporadic shooting during the night have faded.
Many voters in Bangui expressed their determination to slip their ballot into the ballot box so as not to see the infernal cycle of rebellions and the forcible overthrow of power continue.
In the interior, however, the vote, when it was able to take place, often took place in a climate of "
psychosis
".
This is the case in Birao, for example, where it took
the intervention of Minusca
for the polling stations to open.
"
We no longer take power with weapons
"
In Carnot, after a tense day of voting, elements of the 3R armed group finally invaded the locality and destroyed ballot boxes after the departure of Minusca.
In Bouar, where gunshots were heard all morning, Central Africans could not vote at all.
“
In Bouar, early this morning at 3 am, bandits came out and started to open fire.
Naturally, the civilians are not soldiers and taken with fear, they have taken refuge in their homes,
”the Minister of the Interior, Henri Wanzet, told RFI.
However, he welcomes the fact that Minusca's intervention allowed the vote to start in the afternoon in Kaga Bandoro and Bambari.
"
We are at the time of democracy, we no longer take power with arms, that's the 2013 model. We no longer take power by arms, power is through the ballot box
", he adds, believing however that "
the worst has been avoided
".
Théophile Momokoama, the new rapporteur of the ANE, recognizes that in some sub-prefectures the vote did not take place.
He says he is collecting the information but says more than half of the country's sub-prefectures voted without giving more details at this stage.
A “
satisfactory
” record, according to him, in the current context.
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Central African Republic
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