Urnas close in São Tomé, CPLP highlights calm environment

A opening of voting assemblies and voting throughout the day took place normally and peacefully, said the head of the election observation mission of the Community of Portuguese-speaking Countries (CPLP), which was present at the closing of the polls in one of the schools in the capital.

Former Prime Minister of Equatorial Guinea Vicente Ehate Tomi expressed the wish that this would happen during the clearance of the results and even stressed that improvements in the electoral process have been made since the last President in July.

Vicente Ehate Tomi leads the CPLP observation mission, an organization formed by Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Mozambique, Portugal, São Tomé and Príncipe and Timor-Leste.

The European Union’s election observation mission is again headed by Portuguese MEP Sérgio Humberto, while the European Parliament’s delegation – a novelty in relation to the previous election act – is led by Ana Catarina Mendes and is also a member of MEPs Catherine Martins.

In addition to observers from the CPLP and the EU, African Union, G7+ countries, the Economic Community of Central African States (EECAC) and the Network of Jurisdictional and Administrative Bodies of Portuguese-speaking Countries (ROJAE-CPLP) are present.

Today's elections run for four parliamentary parties: Independent Democratic Action (ADI); Movement for the Liberation of São Tomé and Príncipe (MLSTP); Coalition Independent Citizens' Movement/Party of National Unity (MCI-PUN); and Movement Enough.

Three other parties without parliamentary seats vote: the Democratic Convergence Party (DCP), the Democratic Movement Force of Change (MDFM) and the newly created Political Movement Our Earth.

For the legislatures are in dispute 55 seats of the National Assembly and are registered more than 146 thousand voters, an increase of almost 4,000 compared to the presidential elections of 19 July, when Carlos Vila Nova was re-elected, at the first round.