Algeria's president re-elected with nearly 95 percent of vote
Algeria's incumbent President Abdelmadjid Tebboune has been re-elected with almost 95 percent of the vote, the country's electoral authority ANIE said Sunday.
More than 5.3 million people voted for Tebboune, accounting for "94.65 percent of the vote," ANIE head Mohamed Charfi told reporters.
ANIE said it only counted the number of voters who cast a ballot for one of the candidates, excluding blank votes.
Tebboune, 78, has been heavily favoured to secure a second term, in the race against moderate Islamist Abdelaali Hassani, 57, who won 3.17 percent of the vote and socialist candidate Youcef Aouchiche, 41, who won 2.16 percent.
While Tebboune's re-election was certain, his main focus was to boost voter participation in Saturday's poll after a record-low abstention rate of over 60 percent in 2019.
That year, Tebboune became president amid widely boycotted elections and mass pro-democracy Hirak protests that later died out under his tenure with ramped-up policing and hundreds put in jail.
More than 24 million Algerians were registered to vote. But it remained unclear how many people in total had turned out to cast their ballot.
Earlier Sunday, Hassani's campaign denounced attempts to "inflate the results".
It said there had been a "failure to deliver vote-sorting records to the candidates' representatives" and that it recorded "instances of proxy group voting".
ANIE, which extended the vote by one hour on Saturday after reporting an "average" turnout, has yet to give the final rate of participation in the election.
'Youth vote'
Tebboune's win Sunday was still "a victory" although he failed to win the vote of young people, who represent half of Algeria's 45-million-strong population, Abidi said.
Read more on RFI English
Read also:
Less than half of Algeria's voters take part in presidential polls
Algerian election campaign marked by social pledges and claims of unfair play
Algeria heads to polls: Tebboune favoured amid rights concerns
