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Mali: Keita wins presidential election – Opponent Cisse concedes defeat
During his campaign, he ran on a pledge of restoring honor to the country ravaged by an Islamist insurgency that overtook the northern half of the country until military intervention in January pushed out the Islamists.
Many voters said they had chosen Cisse because they thought he could best resolve the crisis in the north, where the Tuareg separatist movement may still pose a threat to the country’s stability. Talks with the separatists are due to begin within 60 days of the formation of Keita’s government and many Malians remain wary of negotiating with the group whose rebellion sparked more than a year of chaos in what was once one of West Africa’s most stable democracies.
The first round of presidential voting had featured technical glitches, leaving some voters unclear about where their polling stations were located. However, African Union and European Union electoral observers offered praise for the Malian runoff vote.
“Malians should be congratulated because it seems to me they are regaining control of their democratic destiny, which is in fact nevertheless a tradition that exists in Mali,” said Louis Michel, the head of the EU observer mission.
Ibrahima Sangho, president of the Malian electoral monitoring group known as APEM, also said Sunday’s second-round vote had gone smoothly.
“We think the winner is the people of Mali who have come out in large numbers to vote to show that the people have the will to pull the country out of crisis,” he said. “However, no politician can run Mali as it has been run over the last 20 years. People are going to watch the new president closely and follow him closely over his campaign promises.”
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press
