Polls closed in Burkina Faso on Sunday after a presidential and parliamentary election dominated by the threat of Islamist violence that prevented voting in hundreds of villages.
Polling stations were closed across swathes of the north and east where groups linked to al Qaeda and Islamic State operate. Some that had planned to open were shut because of threats, the electoral commission said.
“People were threatened. They told them: ‘Those who put their fingers in the ink can say goodbye to their finger’,” the commission’s head, Newton Ahmed Barry, told a news conference, referring to the ink marks people are given to show they have voted.
Before election day, official data indicated that at least 400 000 people – nearly 7% of the electorate – were likely to be unable to vote due to polling stations staying shut for fear of violence.
That number could be far higher as many of the 1 million people displaced by unrest in the arid West African country have also found themselves unable to cast ballots.
The expected low turnout puts added strain on the young democracy in the former French colony, where leaders seem “unable to properly address the deteriorating security situation or … the country’s socio-economic woes”, said Alexandre Raymakers, analyst at the London-based risk firm Verisk Maplecroft.
President Roch Kabore is seeking a second five-year term, campaigning on achievements such as free healthcare for children under the age of five and paving some of the red dirt roads that snake across the landlocked country of 21 million.
But the surge in jihadist attacks has eclipsed everything: more than 2,000 people have died in violence this year alone.
“I call on all Burkinabe to vote, whatever their leaning. It’s about the democracy of Burkina Faso, it’s about development, it’s about peace,” Kabore told reporters after voting.
