Sierra Leone's opposition demands re-run amid election rigging allegations

Sierra Leone’s main opposition party has demanded a re-run of the last presidential election after incumbent President Julius Maada Bio was declared the winner and swiftly sworn in for a second term in the West African nation.

The opposition All People’s Congress party, or APC, claimed on Saturday that the country's electoral commission conspired with Bio's party to rig the results.

In a statement, the party also called for the resignation of electoral commission chairman Mohamed Konneh and his entire team among others.

“What culminated in the rogue announcement of fraudulent election results on June 25 was not just a naked theft of the votes of the suffering masses who needed change, it represents the biggest threat to our democracy, unity and survival as a nation,” it said.

According to official results, Bio received 56.17 percent of the vote, enough to beat his main challenger Samura Kamara while avoiding run-off. Electoral officials said Kamara had received 41.16 percent of the ballots cast.

Bio, who already was sworn into his second term several days after the vote, tweeted for “all Sierra Leoneans to be peaceful and law-abiding.”

“This is a collective victory for every citizen and we must come together now that elections are over for the pursuit of a common goal, which is the development of our dear country,” Bio wrote in his social media post.

There have been concerns that Sierra Leoneans who dispute the election's outcome could take to the streets.

Already the West African nation has seen demonstrators protest the state of the economy in recent months. Nearly 60 percent of Sierra Leone’s population of more than seven million are facing poverty, with youth unemployment being one of the highest in West Africa.

The APC’s statement comes as pressure mounts on the electoral commission to open up its conduct of the tabulation process of the election results.

While regional observers like the African Union and ECOWAS declared the elections free and fair, other Western observers have stressed that the counting and tabulation process lacked transparency.

The European Union, the UK, U.S. and France, in particular, have pressured the electoral commission to display results from each polling station.

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Source: TRT