Voting began on Sunday in Equatorial Guinea for the presidential and legislative elections, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, president for 43 years, being assured of being re-elected in this small African country with one of the most authoritarian regimes in the world, noted a journalist from the AFP.
The doors of the polling station of the Nuestra Señora de Bisila school, in the popular district of Semu, opened to let in a few dozen voters who had been waiting since early morning.
Running for a sixth term at the age of 80, Mr. Obiang holds the world record for longevity in power for a head of state, outside the monarchy.
He has always been elected with more than 93% of the vote and his all-powerful Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea (PDGE) holds 99 of the 100 seats in the outgoing National Assembly and 55 in the Senate, which must also be renewed in this election. also including municipalities.
For the presidential election, Teodoro Obiang faces two candidates: Andrès Esono Ondo, for the Convergence for Social Democracy (CPDS), the only opposition party that is not banned, and Buenaventura Monsuy Asumu of the Social Democratic Coalition Party ( PCSD), micro-movement hitherto allied with the PDGE in the legislative elections.
The head of state took power in a coup in 1979 in this small oil country in Central Africa, independent of Spain since 1968, overthrowing his uncle and bloodthirsty dictator Francisco Macias Nguema, whom he shot two months later.
His regime is regularly accused by international NGOs and Western capitals of violently repressing all opposition and flouting human rights, as well as for the extent of corruption.
Sunday, 427,661 Equatoguineans of voting age are called to the polls out of nearly 1.4 million inhabitants.
Third richest country in sub-Saharan Africa by GDP per capita in 2021 according to the World Bank, the bulk of its wealth remains concentrated in the hands of a few families.
In the absence of recent data on the country, the Bretton Woods institution estimated in 2006 that nearly 80% of the population lived below the poverty line (less than US$1.9 per day per inhabitant).