NOUAKCHOTT, Mauritania - The president who has led this Saharan nation for the past 19 years, moving it from support of Saddam Hussein to close ties with Washington and Israel, won re-election, his government declared Saturday. The top challenger, who was backed by Islamic hard-liners, emerged from hiding and claimed the vote was a fraud.
President Maaoya Sid'Ahmed Ould Taya's victory ensured that Mauritania - a nation dominated by its Arab population - will remain a rare ally in the region of both Israel and the United States.
After all votes were tallied, the Interior Ministry declared Taya the first-round winner with 67 percent of Friday's vote. The results must still be validated by the courts.
His strongest competitor among five challengers, fundamentalist-backed Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidalla, trailed with 19 percent, the Interior Ministry said.
To avoid a runoff, Taya needed support from 50 percent voters in a nation that straddles Arab and African worlds on the edge of the Sahara.
The country has never seen a peaceful and democratic transfer of power since independence from France in 1960. Taya himself seized control in a 1984 coup, overthrowing Haidalla, then a military dictator.
Taya's veiled and caftaned supporters took to the sun-baked and trash-strewn streets of the capital to celebrate Saturday's results.
Waving scarves, they honked horns and craned out of car windows to wave at the longtime leader's posters and cheer.
Here we have tranquility and security ... the future looks good for Mauritania
declared Mohamed Ould N'Diak, a civil servant in blue robe and turban, and like many of Mauritania's governing class, an Arab.
Haidalla, an Arab like Taya, went into hiding as soon as polls closed Friday, fearing detention after security forces abruptly arrested, then released, him on election eve.
He emerged a day later, however, to tell reporters that while he still feared arrest, the captain can't abandon a sinking ship.
The opposition candidate gathered with two other challengers to denounce the vote as an electoral masquerade that they would challenge in Mauritania's highest court.
From hiding, Haidalla and other opposition figures denounced the election, and demanded a new one.
The fraud was flagrant and there has been intimidation for weeks Haidalla campaign spokeswoman Hindou Gueye said, promising a legal challenge, but no violence.
We are a peaceful movement
she said.
Taya's regime rejected European Union election observers, and was accused of closing election venues to both local and international monitors.
Security forces put up checkpoints around the presidential palace and other government buildings as the votes were counted, just six months after Taya withstood a coup attempt his administration blamed on Muslim hard-liners.
Both leading candidates accused the other of plotting to take power by force or by fraud, regardless of the true vote count.
Taya called for calm, promising in a brief, nationally televised address that the people will enjoy democracy and stability.
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Democratic Party leader Naoto Kan places a rose on the name of his party's Parliamentary election candidate Shu Watanabe at campaign headquarters in Tokyo, yesterday. Japan's opposition made big gains in elections yesterday, narrowing the ruling coalition
