Sierra Leone polls: Opposition SLPP overtakes ruling APC by 15,000 votes [75% official results]

Sierra Leone’s elections body, the National Electoral Commission (NEC) on Sunday released more official results with respect to the presidential polls of March 7, 2018.

With 75% of official results declared, here are the top four:

• Main opposition SLPP’s Julius Maada Bio – 848,438 (43.3%)
• Ruling APC candidate, Samura Kamara – 833,519 (42.6%)
• Kandeh Yumkella (NGC) – 136,009 (6.9%)
• Samuel Sam-Sumana (C4C) – 67,132 (3.4%)

pic.twitter.com/Ga7KkLIOvg

— National Electoral Commission of Sierra Leone (@NECsalone) March 11, 2018

This is the first time that the opposition SLPP has taken the lead since official results were first released by the electoral commission.

At 25%, the ruling APC was leading with over 17,000 votes.

• Ruling APC candidate, Samura Kamara = 291,933 votes (44.64%.)
• Main opposition SLPP’s Julius Maada Bio = 274,352 (41.94%).
• Kandeh Yumkella (NGC) = 43,117 (6.59%)
• Samuel Sam-Sumana (C4C) = 21,713 (3.32%)

The opposition SLPP then closed the gap drastically to just over 1,000 votes at 50%.

• Ruling APC candidate, Samura Kamara leads with 566,113 votes (43.2%.)
• Main opposition SLPP’s Julius Maada Bio with 564,687 (43.1%).
• Kandeh Yumkella (NGC) is third with 87,722 (6.7%)
• Samuel Sam-Sumana (C4C) is fourth with 44,685 (3.4%.)

The electoral commission chair Mohameed Conteh reassured Sierra Leoneans that everything is being done to safeguard the choice they made on March 7. He also mentioned that vote recounts and investigations against some electoral officials are underway in some districts.

“We have been in regular dialogue with political parties, since long before the election; and we have remained in contact and responded promptly to each of their concerns. We believe that trust is paramount.”

An electoral observer coalition had soon after the vote projected the likelihood of a run-off from their use of the Parallel Voter Tabulation (PVT) collation technology.

A run-off presidential election between the first and second placed candidates is held two weeks after the certification of the results, unless a candidate wins 55% in the first round.

The parliamentary and council elections are decided in a single round, first past the post system. A total of 132 MPs are elected from a choice of 752 candidates fielded by 17 parties (as well as 40 independents).

Additionally, there are 2,741 candidates for a total of 511 elected local positions as councillors, council chairpersons and mayors.