President Bouteflika set to address the people to renew attachment to his pledges
In the wake of the April 17 Presidential elections in Algeria, the constitutional council has now wrapped up the thorough examining of the various reports sent to the council by the local and provincial electoral commissions and those from abroad pertaining to the election returns and the relevant appeals introduced by some of the vying candidates.
The constitutional council said in a statement that most of the appeals numbering 94 in all had been turned down while some others had been duly taken into account in the final vote tally.
After making a deep perusal of the submitted files, the constitutional council officially confirmed, in line with article 71 of the constitution, that independent candidate Abdellaziz Bouteflika obtained the absolute majority of the votes cast in the first round, that is 8 million, five hundred and thirty one thousand and three hundred and eleven votes (8.531.311 votes) in his favour.
Ali Benflis ranked second in the final vote tally with 1.288.338 votes, followed by Abdellaziz Belaid with 328.030 votes, and then by Louiza Hanoune with 157.792 votes, Ali Fawzi Rebaine for his part came fifth with 105.223 votes and finally Moussa Touati ranked sixth with 58.154 votes, according to the official election returns issued by the constitutional council on Tuesday evening.
Thereby, the constitutional council officially proclaimed Mr Abdellaziz Bouteflika as the President of the Democratic and People’s Republic of Algeria who will start his functions shortly after taking the oath of office (probably next Monday April 28th 2014) in conformity with article 75 of the country’s constitution.