BRAZZAVILLE — The Republic of Congo’s ruling party won a majority in last week’s parliamentary election, based on provisional results seen by AFP on Saturday as opposition groups alleged electoral fraud.

Congolese Territorial Administration Minister Guy Georges Mbaka announced the results of the July 10 poll on national television early Friday.

His ministry subsequently allowed journalists, including an AFP correspondent, to see the provisional results on Saturday.

According to these results, the Congolese Labour Party (PCT) won 103 out of 151 assembly seats.

The PCT is the party of President Denis Sassou Nguesso, a 78-year-old former paratrooper who first came to power in the central African nation in 1979.

Smaller parties allied with the PCT won 13 seats, according to the provisional results.

“The PCT won again because it is a unifying party that has no ethnic problems,” said party representative Serge Ikiemi.

Opposition groups in the Republic of Congo, which is also known as Congo-Brazzaville, denounced the results as fraudulent.

A civil-society group called “Let’s Turn the Page” said Friday the vote was marked by “cheating, fraud and scenes of open corruption.”

Independent candidate Vivien Manangou, who was defeated by a PCT member in a bid for an assembly seat, told AFP that “the results did not come from the ballot box at all.”

The country’s leading opposition party, the Pan-African Union for Social Democracy (UPADS) won four seats, according to the provisional results. UDH-Yuki, another opposition party, won two.

Two other small opposition parties boycotted last week’s vote over fears the election would be rigged.

A run-off vote scheduled for July 24 will decide 27 unfilled assembly seats.

Source: Voice of America