Fears of violence overshadow DR Congo vote count

Fears of violence Tuesday overshadowed the final stages of the DR Congo election results count, as President Joseph Kabila took a 10-point lead over top challenger Etienne Tshisekedi.

With just over two-thirds of polling centres counted, Kabila, the Democratic Republic of Congo's ruler since 2001, had 46.4 percent of the vote to 36.2 percent for Tshisekedi.

Observers have warned the November 28 polls, the second since back-to-back wars from 1996 to 2003, could plunge the vast central African country into chaos no matter who is declared the winner.

The tension spilled over Monday into the Congolese diaspora in Belgium and South Africa, where opposition supporters clashed with police.

The Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI) was due to release a provisional final count Tuesday, a result the supreme court must then review and make official by December 17. The winner is scheduled to be sworn in on December 20.

But CENI chief Daniel Ngoy Mulunda indicated early Tuesday the commission may not make its deadline.

"First of all we're going to make sure that all the results sheets have arrived and that we have all the information. If not, we won't be able to give you more than a partial report," he told journalists at a press conference held in the early hours of Tuesday to announce the latest results.

The CENI had been criticised for releasing figures that came mainly from Kabila strongholds, but the latest tally was more geographically balanced.

As counting entered the home stretch, Kabila appeared poised to benefit from January constitutional changes that scrapped two-round elections in favour of a single-round system, with the divided opposition field of 10 candidates splitting more than half the vote.

Tshisekedi has issued thinly veiled threats of violence if early results showing Kabila in the lead are not reversed.

On Saturday, he warned Kabila and Mulunda to "respect the will of the Congolese people."

"If they don't, they risk committing suicidal acts," said the challenger, a prime minister-turned-opponent of former dictator Mobutu Sese Seko.

"I call all our people to stay vigilant so that if needed they can execute the orders I will give them."

Tshisekedi, who calls his supporters fighters, raised global concern and condemnation during the campaign when he called on his partisans to break into the country's prisons and free their comrades.

The International Crisis Group has put the country on its "conflict risk alert" together with Syria, citing clashes in Kinshasa on the eve of the polls, deadly rebel attacks in the southeastern city of Lubumbashi on voting day, and a call from several opposition candidates for the vote to be annulled.

ElBaradei says Egypt's Islamists rely on slogans

Egyptian presidential candidate Mohamed ElBaradei has accused Islamist parties which won a majority in elections last week of relying on slogans which he said would be laid bare if they gained power.

The Islamists picked up two-thirds of votes cast for parties in the election last Monday and Tuesday in a third of Egypt's districts, with a new hardline Salafi party winning almost a quarter.

"Let them govern and have their chance. People will realise that slogans are not enough," ElBaradei said in an interview published on Tuesday by the independent newspaper Al Shuruq.

The former head of the UN nuclear watchdog and Nobel laureate is close to the liberal pro-democracy movement that toppled the 30-year regime of autocrat Hosni Mubarak in February.

He is also an outspoken critic of the military rulers who took power after the ousting of Mubarak, accusing them of mishandling the process of ushering in democracy in the Arab world's most populous nation.

"We live today in a fascist system with military tribunals and emergency law and if there is another round of the revolution it will be full of anger and violence," he warned.

"The situation is going from bad to worse after the failure of the military council in managing the transition process," said ElBaradei, adding that young Egyptians were "completely despondent because nothing has changed."

Last month, 43 people were killed and more than 3,000 injured in clashes between security forces and protesters who again took to the streets to demand the resignation of the military council, which they suspect of wanting to retain power.

The army pushed back the original timetable for handing over power to civilian leaders and had proposed a series of measures to shield itself from scrutiny from the new elected government.

"If new elections take places in one or four years, it is you, the youth, that is going to govern," ElBaradei added

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