ALGIERS -- Army-backed Abdelaziz Bouteflika was declared winner of Algeria's one-man presidential elections today, taking 74 percent of the votes cast in a poll marked by low turnout after all other candidates pulled out to protest alleged ballot-rigging.
Interior Minister Abdelmalek Sellal said that final results of Thursday's poll showed Bouteflika, a former foreign minister preferred by the dominant military establishment, got more than 7.4 million of the 10.5 million votes from Algerians.Even by official counts, the percentage of eligible Algerians who actually cast their votes was down sharply from 1995 elections.
Sellal said 60.25 percent of Algeria's 17.5 million electorate voted, compared with nearly 75 percent in a similar poll in 1995. But more than 454,000 ballots of this year's election were ruled as void, he added.
Bouteflika will take over from outgoing President Liamine Zeroual within a week after Algeria's election watchdog, the Constitutional Council, approved the final results, Sellal said. He gave no specific date.
Ahmed Taleb Ibrahimi, a former foreign minister supported by the outlawed Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), came second with 12.53 percent, followed by Islamist Abdallah Djaballah of the Movement for National Reform with 3.95 percent of the votes.
Ibrahimi and Djaballah were among the six candidates who withdrew from the contest just 24 hours before voting began. They had said they would not recognize the results and vowed to "mobilize Algerian citizens to impose a true democracy."
Spokesman for the six former candidates, Djamel Zanati, said the men would call for nationwide demonstrations today to protest the election.
But the army-led authorities banned any such protests.
"A demand for authorization to stage gatherings or marches must be submitted to the authorities eight full days ahead of the march date. Every demonstration taking place without due authorization is considered an illegal gathering," an official statement said.