NIAMEY, Jan. 2 (Xinhua) -- The candidate of the Nigerien Party for Democracy and Socialism (PNDS) Mohamed Bazoum and Mahamane Ousmane from the Democratic and Republican Renewal are qualified for the second round of the presidential elections in Niger, winning 39.33 percent and 16.99 percent votes respectively, according to the provisional results made public on Saturday by the Independent National Electoral Commission (CENI).
According to Niger's Constitution, the presidential term of Niger is five years, presidential candidate who gets more than 50 percent of the votes will win the election. If no one gets more than half of the votes in the first round, the candidates with the top two votes will enter the second round of competition.
According to the president of the CENI Issaka Souna, the second round is scheduled for Feb. 21. The number of voters in the first round is estimated at 4,778,573 out of 7,746,556 registered voters, with a participation rate of 69.67 percent.
The PNDS and the main opposition party, the Nigerian Democratic Movement for an African Federation led by former Prime Minister Hama Amadou, led the legislative elections with 19 and 20 seats respectively, out of 171 seats in the parliament.
The first round of Niger presidential and legislative elections was held on Dec. 27. More than 7.4 million people are called to vote in about 26,000 polling stations and choose among 30 candidates the successor of the incubent President Mahamadou Issoufou, who is not running for a third term, as well as 171 representatives in parliament among 4,205 contestants representing more than 100 political parties. Enditem
