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Ex-rebel group set for victory
05/07/2005 11:47 - (SA)
Bujumbura - Burundi's main Hutu ex-rebel group held a commanding lead in this week's legislative elections with early returns from partial results on Tuesday showing it with more than 60% of the vote.
As returns from Monday's elections trickled in from polling stations across the country, the Forces for the Defence of Democracy (FDD), which swept local polls last month, appeared firmly ahead of its chief Hutu-led rival, President Domitien Ndayizeye's Front for Democracy in Burundi (Frodebu) party.
Results representing 865 890 votes, nearly a third of the number of registered voters, the political wing of the FDD, the National Council for the Defence of Democracy (CNDD-FDD), had 63%.
Frodebu was running a poor second with 21% and the main party of the Tutsi minority had 10%, according to the AFP count, compiled from partial results reported by national radio and television from individual polling stations.
Official preliminary results expected soon
Official preliminary returns from the country's first election for national lawmakers since ethnically driven civil war erupted in 1993 were expected to be released later on Tuesday by the National Independent Electoral Commission (Ceni).
The United Nations Operation in Burundi (Onub) has estimated voter turnout was about 65% in the elections which were held under tight security after violence marred local polls in June when turnout was about 80%.
Onub said turnout was lower due to residual fear from insecurity during the June elections in which grenade attacks and gunshots killed one person and injured more than a dozen others including a UN peacekeeper.
In the only serious incident reported on Monday, a Burundian soldier was slightly injured when a grenade exploded near a Bujumbura polling station after it had closed as vote counting began, police said.
Results comparable with municipal elections
Though not official, the results compiled by AFP are comparable with those registered in the June 3 municipal elections in which the CNDD-FDD won 57% of the votes cast, followed by Frodebu with 23% and Uprona with 6%.
In the last parliamentary elections held in 1993, Frodebu won more than 80% of the vote.
Monday's elections saw some 3 704 candidates from 25 political parties, of which six are former rebel groups, as well as 15 independents battle it out in the country's 100 constituencies.
Lawmakers elected on Monday will be joined by senators picked by municipal councillors on July 29 to elect the country's first post-transitional president.
The FDD is already almost certain of a majority in the upper house due to its strong showing in the local polls and analysts have predicted the group's leader, Pierre Nkurunziza, will become Burundi's next president when parliament chooses the next head of government on August 19.
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