Campaigning wraps up in Mali's watershed elections

Campaigning in Mali's presidential election ended Friday, two days ahead of a vote seen as vital for a return to peace in a country traumatised by war and political chaos. Voters will have a choice of 27 candidates as they go to the polls on Sunday. It is the first vote since a separatist uprising led to a coup and then an Islamist offensive last year in what had been up until then, one of the region's most stable democracies. The transitional government declared Friday a public holiday to allow as many Malians as possible to collect their voter cards. The latest figures showed 85 percent had been distributed to the electorate of almost seven million. The three-week campaign has played out without major incident, although renewed violence in the north last week cast doubt over Mali's readiness to deliver a safe election and a credible result. Louis Michel, head of the European Union observation mission, said voting conditions had been met for the first round, which will be followed by a run-off on August 11 if no majority winner emerges on Sunday. "I believe that these elections can take place in a context and in conditions that are acceptable and do not allow for a distortion or an abuse of the result," he told reporters in the capital Bamako. "I really think the personality who emerges during this election will have more than enough legitimacy." One hundred EU observers will visit five of the eight administrative regions of Mali on Sunday but will not go to the restive northern provinces of Timbuktu, Gao and Kidal, where tensions remain high. The credibility of polling in the three regions -- which make up almost two-thirds of Mali -- will be seen as hugely symbolic, although in reality they are home to just 10 percent of the 15 million population and cannot significantly influence the outcome. Much of the worry ahead of the polls had focused on Kidal, occupied for five months by Tuareg separatists until a ceasefire earlier this month allowed the Malian army to provide security. Clashes between Tuaregs and black Africans a week ago left four dead while five polling officials were kidnapped in Tessalit, 200 kilometres (125 miles) north of Kidal, by gunmen thought to be from the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA). The ballot will be the first since a coup in March last year toppled democratically elected president Amadou Toumani Toure and created an opening that allowed the MNLA and groups allied to Al-Qaeda to seize northern Mali. A UN peacekeeping mission integrating more than 6,000 west African soldiers is charged with ensuring security and will grow to 11,200 troops, plus 1,400 police, by the end of the year. The allows France to start withdrawing most of the 4,500 troops sent to Mali in January to stop Islamists from advancing towards the capital, Bamako. The list of candidates to become Mali's next president features four former prime ministers, political heavyweights -- but just one woman. Haidara Aichata Cisse, a legislator for a constituency near Gao, will challenge 26 men, including former leader Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, Cheick Modibo Diarra, Modibo Sidibe and Soumana Sacko. Keita, prime minister from 1994 to 2000 and president of the National Assembly for five years from 2002, is seen as the frontrunner alongside Soumaila Cisse, former chairman of the Commission of the West African Monetary Union. Keita delivered a wide-ranging speech in front of thousands at his final rally in Bamako Friday, suggesting rivals had funded their campaigns through "drug money". He vowed to ensure that "no one will make fun of Mali again" and appealed for a calm election day, telling his supporters that "it is my hope that come Sunday night, the whole of Mali will be laughing". In Gao, supporters of Dramane Dembele, the candidate of Mali's largest party Adema, held a final meeting in front of hundreds of activists. In Cisse's Gao campaign headquarters, there was an air of quiet confidence, although his supporters said they took nothing for granted. As campaigning finished, UN chief Ban Ki Moon called for a "peaceful" vote, urging Malians to "exercise their democratic right".