Polling stations opened for more than 16 million registered Sudanese voters in over 10,700 stations on Sunday [Fatma Naib]
Published On 11 Apr 201011 Apr 2010
The multi-party elections are the first to be held during the presidency of Omar al-Bashir, the Sudanese president [Fatma Naib]
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The vote, which got off to a slow start, will last for three days [Fatma Naib]
Voters will select their choice for president as well as legislative and local representatives [Fatma Naib]
A vote in the south will also take place to elect the leader of the semi-autonomous government of south Sudan [Fatma Naib]
The election has been marred by an opposition boycott, fraud allegations and logistical problems [Fatma Naib]
Critics have said free and fair conditions for the elections are not in place [Fatma Naib]
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But Jimmy Carter, the former US president, whose Carter Centre is monitoring the vote, said that despite the snags, voting was proceeding smoothly [Fatma Naib]
The vote is an essential step in a 2005 peace plan that ended two decades of a civil war between the north and south.
Many hope the election would begin a process of healing the wounds of the north-south conflict in the impoverished country [Fatma Naib]
Lorries loaded with uniformed security forces were deployed around the capital Khartoum and police issued stern warnings that no disturbances would be tolerated [Fatma Naib]
Despite the boycotts and logistical problems, people turned out to vote for the more than 14,000 candidates from 73 different parties [Fatma Naib]
