Back انتخابات الرئاسة التوغوية 2010 Arabic Präsidentschaftswahl in Togo 2010 German Elecciones presidenciales de Togo de 2010 Spanish Élection présidentielle togolaise de 2010 French Elezioni presidenziali in Togo del 2010 Italian Wybory prezydenckie w Togo w 2010 roku Polish Eleição presidencial no Togo em 2010 Portuguese Президентские выборы в Того (2010) Russian
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 Africa portal |
Presidential elections were held in Togo on 4 March 2010.[1] Incumbent President Faure Gnassingbé—who won his first term in a presidential election that followed the death of his father, long-time President Gnassingbé Eyadema, in 2005—faced radical opposition candidate Jean-Pierre Fabre, the Secretary-General of the Union of the Forces of Change (UFC), as well as several minor opposition candidates.
Following the democratization process of the early 1990s, which proved largely abortive, Eyadema and his ruling party, the Rally of the Togolese People (RPT), successively won all presidential elections, although those elections were always extremely controversial: the opposition boycotted the 1993 presidential election altogether, and it claimed that Eyadema won the 1998 presidential election and the 2003 presidential election only through fraud. Eyadema died in 2005 and his son Faure Gnassingbé then ran as the RPT candidate; although he officially won the election, the opposition again disputed the result, and serious violence erupted.
Ahead of the 2010 election, the Togolese government took steps to increase the credibility of the electoral process and reassure the international community that the election would be free and fair. It placed a particular priority on avoiding the violence that marred the 2005 election. Gnassingbé stood for a second term as the candidate of the RPT, while the UFC designated Fabre as its candidate due to health problems suffered by its president, Gilchrist Olympio. Although the UFC was the largest opposition party by a large measure, and although the election was to be decided in a single round on a first past the post basis, the other opposition parties largely refused to rally behind Fabre and chose to nominate their own candidates.
Provisional results showed Gnassingbé winning the election with 61% of the vote, while Fabre trailed with 34%. The opposition again alleged fraud, denouncing the method by which the results were transmitted to the electoral commission, and subsequently held regular protests in Lomé. The results were confirmed by the Constitutional Court and Gnassingbé was sworn in for a second term on 3 May 2010.
- ^ Togo: la présidentielle reportée du 28 février au 4 mars AFP, 11 February 2010 (in French)