President Abdelmadjid Tebboune is elected for a second term in gas-rich Algeria

ALGIERS, Algeria – President Abdelmadjid Tebboune has been declared the winner of Algeria's presidential election, giving him another term at the helm of the natural gas-rich North African country, five years after his predecessor was ousted amid pro-democracy protests.

The result came as no surprise to most observers, either internationally or in Algeria: the country's independent electoral authority announced on Sunday that Tebboune had won 94 percent of the vote. He thus left his challengers, the Islamist Abdelali Hassani Cherif, who received only three percent, and the socialist Youcef Aouchiche, who received only 2.1 percent, far behind.

Election officials reported that fewer than six million of the country's 24 million eligible voters turned out to vote on Saturday, continuing the low turnout that marred Tebboune's first term and raising doubts about his popular support.

Tebboune's share of the vote was far higher than the 87% that Vladimir Putin won in Russia's March elections and the 92% that Ilham Aliyev received in Azerbaijan's February elections. Independent observers were not allowed in Russia or Algeria and were arrested in Azerbaijan.

Tebboune's lead far exceeds his victory in 2019, when he received 58% of the vote and his closest challenger won 17%.

As of Sunday afternoon, the authorities had not released official figures on voter turnout. However, the preliminary figures did not match the preliminary figures released late Saturday evening, when the electoral authority said turnout was 48 percent in Algeria and 19.6 percent in other constituencies.

Algeria is the largest country in Africa in terms of area and, with a population of almost 45 million, the second most populous country on the continent after South Africa, where presidential elections will be held in 2024 – this year there will be over 50 elections worldwide in which more than half of the world's population will take part.

Throughout the election campaign, activists and international organizations, including Amnesty International, railed against the repressive atmosphere during the campaign and the harassment and prosecution of members of opposition parties, media organizations and civil society groups. Some condemned the election as a rubber-stamping exercise that could only cement the status quo.

But Tebboune and his two challengers both pushed for political participation and made targeted offers to Algerian youth, who make up the majority of the population and suffer disproportionately from poverty and unemployment.

Nearly half of the natural gas-rich North African country's voters have cast their ballots, the National Independent Electoral Authority said hours after polls closed. The provisional figure exceeds turnout five years ago, when Abdelmadjid Tebboune won his first term as president despite a boycott of the election by the pro-democracy protesters whose weekly demonstrations led to the ouster of his predecessor.

Increased voter turnout was a widely cited goal of Tebboune and his two challengers. Each of the three candidates called for political participation, while other activists and political parties called for a further boycott, fearing that the election would only cement and legitimize the status quo.

Before officials announced Tebboune's overwhelming victory, his opponents complained about delays and claimed there were irregularities in the transmission of data to the public and the candidates' campaign offices.

Ahmed Sadok, campaign manager of Islamist Abdelali Hassani Cherif, drew attention to that timeline in a statement on Sunday, claiming there had been a failure to provide vote-counting documents to candidates' representatives. He said the Society for Peace Movement, Cherif's moderate Islamist party, had recorded cases of proxy voting by groups as well as pressure on poll workers to inflate certain numbers, which it did not specify.