NOUAKCHOTT — Early poll results put Mauritania ruling party candidate Mohamed Ould Ghazouani comfortably ahead after Saturday’s presidential election, taking 50.41% of the ballot with more than half votes counted, data from the electoral commission showed. His nearest rival, Biram Dah Abeid, a prominent black Mauritanian slavery campaigner, has got 18.72% so far, the figures showed on Sunday. Mohamed Ould Boubacar, who is backed by Mauritania’s biggest Islamist party, has 18.13%, with support for the other two candidates in single figures. But President Aziz has been criticized for not facing up to the country’s most searing injustice: the persistence of slavery. That is despite the practice being abolished in 1981 and criminalized in 2007, the year before Aziz took power.

Source: National Post June 23, 2019 08:50 UTC