Fifth term for Seychelles president

Long lines formed during the three-day poll

Seychelles President Albert Rene has won another term in office, after three days of voting in this chain of Indian Ocean islands.

The Electoral Commission in the Seychelles announced that Mr Rene had secured 54% of the vote, beating off a challenge from the opposition candidate, Wavel Ramkalawan, who won 45% of the votes.

Mr Ramkalawan of the Seychelles National Party told news agencies: "We are not going to endorse these results because of the blatant abuses which have taken place."

"There was intimidation, there was the offering of money in order to vote for the Seychelles People's Progressive Front [Mr Rene's party]."

He said he would consider action in the courts to challenge the result.

A government spokesman rejected claims of fraud.

"The election was free and fair. There have been checks all the way," said Gilbert Pool, a special adviser to President Rene.

"We have to accept the result, the people have given their point of view."

It is the third win for President Rene since multi-party democracy was established in the early 1990s.

"The vote shows that the Seychelles people are confident in me, my party and my programme, and have believed what I have said," Mr Rene said on state television

Popularity

Mr Rene called the election two years before the end of his current term, scheduled to end in 2003, according to Mr Rene in order to show investors there was political stability in the nation.

President Rene is blamed for economic woes

Mr Rene seized power in the Seychelles in 1977, but the island returned to multi-party rule in 1993, since when he has twice been elected with a large majority.

He won more than 60% of the vote in the last elections in 1998 against Mr Ramkalawan's 20%.

But the Seychelles has suffered a severe foreign exchange shortage in the past year, which has hurt small businesses and emptied shop shelves.

Mr Rene's political rivals blame the island's woes on a civil service and judiciary they say is rife with nepotism and corruption.

High turnout

Turnout was high with 50,238 votes cast among the 60,000 voters in Seychelles over the three days of polling.

The majority of them live in the three main islands of Mahe, Praslin and La Digue, where long queues were reported at polling stations.

Ballot boxes were also airlifted around some of the 115 islands that make up the Seychelles.

A box was taken on a four-hour boat trip to Aldabra Island, where there are only eight registered voters, and giant tortoises outnumber people.