- According to initial reports, President Patrice Talon will retain his position.
- Elections took place among violent protests over President Patrice Talon’s broken promise to serve only one term in office.
Voters have cast their votes yesterday in Benin to elect their new President. According to initial reports, President Patrice Talon will retain his position. Elections took place among violent protests over President Patrice Talon’s broken promise to serve only one term in office. He is opposed by just two other two little-known rivals, Alassane Soumanou and Corentin Kohoue. Several key opposition figures – have either been arrested and or are in exile.
Benin is regarded as the birthplace of African multiparty democracy. In 1991 Benin’s former President Mathieu Kérékou became the first West African leader to admit defeat in an election.
Critics say Talon has ushered the country into authoritarianism with a steady crackdown on his opponents. Talon, a 62-year-old cotton magnate was first elected in 2016. He then pledged to serve only one term. Later he pushed through to election laws that he said were aimed at streamlining unwieldy government institutions. Benin’s image as a democratic model was crushed in 2019 when new electoral laws were introduced. With the new law, a political party had to pay about $424,000 (£328,000) to field a list for the 83-seat parliament.
His campaign focussed on improvements to key infrastructure such as roads, water and energy supplies. Benin became Africa’s top cotton exporter in 2018 and achieved average annual gross domestic product growth of over 5 percent before the global economic disruption caused by the Pandemic. He claims to win a “knock-out victory”.
