Polls opened in Guinea on Sunday, but the country’s opposition candidates claim there is little chance of the vote being free and fair.
Voters lined up across Guinea’s ocean-side capital early Sunday. President Alpha Conde is running for a second term against seven opposition candidates.
While looting and clashes between rival political supporters occurred earlier in the week in Guinea, there was no sign of trouble in Conakry as polls opened.
But Guinea’s opposition was already decrying the election. In an interview Saturday evening, leading opposition candidate Cellou Dalein Diallo told VOA he had no confidence in the electoral commission. He said he and the six other opposition challengers would reject the polls if they believed they were rigged.
Diallo says if the results announced by the electoral commission or the supreme court do not reflect the voters’ will, then he will not accept them.
In Conakry’s Hafia Minierre II neighborhood, voters waited calmly at roadside polling stations. Presiding officer Djenabou Sedec said everything was going smoothly.
Sedec says she was the first to vote this morning, to give an example to all the other voters. Now, everyone is voting.