Guinea's opposition on Monday called for a re-run of this weekend's first-round presidential vote, condemning the ballot as fraudulent even before the results were in and pledging to take to the streets in protest.

"We cannot accept this ballot, we request it be annulled. We will not accept the results of this vote," opposition leader Cellou Dalein Diallo said at a press conference also attended by the six other candidates challenging incumbent President Alpha Conde.

"We will not give in, we have the right to demonstrate, we will demonstrate," he added.

Voters appeared to have turned out massively for Sunday's ballot, which was only the second democratic presidential election in the west African country since independence in 1958.

First official results are not expected before Tuesday.
Despite clashes between Conde and Diallo supporters in the final days of the campaign that left a dozen people dead, voting was peaceful though the opposition complained about logistical problems.

Some polling stations opened late, some were short of envelopes. Some voters turned up without voter ID cards while others failed to be listed on the registers. Some registers were neither in alphabetical nor numerical order.

"It was a masquerade, a massive fraud throughout the day," said Diallo.

- 'Stay calm' -

While the other six candidates backed his stand, none called for a protest, and the single woman running for election, Marie Madeleine Dioubate, urged her supporters to "stay calm, stay off the streets."

Even before voting opened, opposition parties had warned of fraud and vote-rigging and accused the country's Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI) of mismanaging the poll.
Conde, who is 77, was elected five years ago to head the mineral-rich but poor nation after returning from three decades in exile to defeat Diallo, a former prime minister, who is again his closest rival.

With no electricity in many polling stations, an AFP journalist watched votes being counted at a school in a Conakry suburb where the CENI had distributed a handful of torches.

Security forces kept an eye on the work, but local residents anxious about fraud also watched, relaying results to family and friends by telephone.

Fatoumata Kante said she had remained behind to monitor the count "to see that it is free and fair, because there are many people who don't believe the authorities when they say that it's free and transparent."
Diallo's Union of Democratic Forces of Guinea (UFDG) party complained the CENI breached the electoral code, saying "for instance in mid-afternoon it authorised voting without envelopes."

One of three former premiers running for the presidency, Sidya Toure, slammed logistical problems, saying "all this mess was organised on purpose to lead to a declaration of results that in no way corresponds to the will of the people."

The European Union's observer mission is to hold a press conference Tuesday at 1000 GMT on the election.

On Sunday around midday, the head of the EU observer team Frank Engel was upbeat, saying the vote was "going well" despite delays that caused "a degree of annoyance" among voters.

"What we have seen, observed and what has been reported to us does not in my view mar the proper conduct of the vote," Engel said at the time, while acknowledging that the CENI was "probably less ready than it thought it was".Conde campaigned on his track record of reforms to the army and judiciary and improved supply of hydroelectric power.

"After the Ebola epidemic, Guinea really needs to unite to get back to moving forward," the president said, arguing that the outbreak that began in December 2013 was a major setback to progress. The disease spread to Liberia and Sierra Leone and claimed some 2,500 lives in Guinea alone.

But his foes accused him of poor management, including the handling of the Ebola crisis, and said he wields too much power in isolation while stirring up tension among ethnic groups.

Conde has the backing of the Malinke people while many of the Fulani people, the country's biggest and wealthiest community but who have never been in power, support Diallo.

Source: AFP