© Provided by Agencia EFE
Bangkok, March 19 (EFE).- Some 860,000 Timorese are called to the polls this Saturday to elect the future president in the elections with the largest number of candidates that have been held to date in this small and young nation.
The polling stations opened at 07:00 a.m. (22:00 GMT on Friday) and since then they have registered a “high influx” of voters, European parliamentarian Domènec Ruiz Devesa, head of the European Union Timor Electoral Observation Mission, told Efe. -East 2022.
“The schools have opened normally. We have not received information regarding complaints or protests. They are well-organized elections, with the right material and personnel,” said the Spanish politician, who is leading this mission with 20 teams deployed and who will visit 150 schools during the day.
The veteran politician and Nobel Peace Prize winner, José Ramos-Horta, and the current president, Francisco “Lu-Olo” Guterres, start out as the candidates with the most options to occupy this position for the next five years with fewer prerogatives than the prime minister, but that can veto laws and elect the head of government.
In addition to these two candidates, there are also 14 other candidates, including four women and several budding student leaders.
The elections are marked by the young vote, almost 20 percent will cast the vote for the first time, which, according to analysts, might end the hegemony of these influential figures who played a relevant role in the resistance to the brutal Indonesian occupation, among 1975 and 1999.
The youngest nation in Asia, which achieved independence in 2002 following a brief period of administration by the United Nations, is also one of the best democracies in Southeast Asia, behind only Malaysia in the democracy index of the Unity of Intelligence from The Economist.
East Timor, which will celebrate 20 years of independence on May 20, is facing high levels of poverty and a worrying rate of youth unemployment, in addition to the negative economic effects of the pandemic.
EU observers have participated in every election cycle since 2002.
Ruiz Devesa highlights the “strength” and “progress”, since independence, of this “young and vibrant democracy in a part of the world where the model we share is not lavish”.
The polling stations will close at 3:00 p.m. (5:00 GMT) and it is expected that tonight or on Sunday the first results will begin to be known, which will not be official until next week.
If no candidate achieves 50 percent of the ballots, a second round will be held on April 19 between the two candidates with the highest number of votes.
(c) EFE Agency