Djibouti presidential candidate Ismail Omar Guelleh campaigning in the Djibouti countryside April, 1999. Diana Cahn/ Press Association. All rights reserved.The 120,000 voters expected to turn out at today’s presidential election in Djibouti might seem spoilt for choice with six candidates on the ballot paper. But the winner is already clear – President Ismael Omar Guelleh (‘IOG’), in power since 1999 and running for a fourth term – while the man seen as the clean pair of hands who rallied those seeking an alternative to the regime, former journalist Daher Ahmed Farah (‘DAF’), is boycotting the poll and permanently looking over his shoulder. He only leaves home for essential meetings to avoid harassment by the authorities, and eschews cafés in case someone tries to poison him.
Reports on social media and from opposition activists suggest DAF’s call for a “ville morte” public boycott of the polls was having some impact this morning, with near-empty polling stations, pro-regime activists hustling passers-by to vote, and the state TV broadcaster searching for a polling station with queues of people outside.
The last time Djibouti voted in legislative elections three years ago saw the USN, an opposition coalition newly brought together by DAF on his return from exile in Belgium, ride an unexpectedly large wave of enthusiasm. The next morning, the ruling UMP party proclaimed victory in Djibouti City with 49.4 per cent of the vote, giving it 80% of seats under the proportional system. The USN said there had been a fix and results from individual polling stations showed they had won a majority in the capital; a delegation of EU technical experts backed this up in a never-published report, recalls Dimitri Verdonck of NGO Association Cultures & Progrès. Months of demonstrations, violence and the detention of hundreds of USN members followed (DAF has been arrested more than 25 times since February 2013) and still the government wouldn’t release the polling station returns. On 30 December 2014, the regime signed an agreement with the opposition to deliver an independent national electoral commission. It has proved a dead letter.
