Mr. Jow, Your concern about the electoral process in Cote d'Ivoire, especially developments in the last twelve hours, is shared by many following the abrupt halt to the vote count, or more accurately, vote results. Suspicion of the opposition may have been heightened by the announcement made on behalf of the National Electoral Commission that the election results will now be made public tomorrow (Tuesday ) at 11:00 GMT. With both Guei and Gbagbo claiming victory, what is evident is that the partial results officially released thus far show Gbagbo to be in the lead over Guei by about 10 percentage points (51% to 40.44%) with about 7 per cent of the votes counted/announced. Also evident is that voter turn out has been extremely low (about 30 per cent by some estimates)which further re-enforces the position held by the international community which considers the elections as lacking in credibility, resulting in their withdrawal of financial and technical support. The remarkable calm and serene election atmosphere which prevailed up until mid-day Monday is fast dissipating with Gbagbo's supporters taking to the streets this afternoon. Abidjan is reported to be quiet this evening, however, albeit with heavy army presence in the business district and around the electoral commission's headquarters. We will see what tomorrow brings. NOTE: The national television station has just closed for the day (00:30 GMT) without the usual final newscast. Infact, it has been on auto-pilot (with films and music videos and without voice announcements) since the brief appearance of the newscaster at around 20:00 promising more results. Sidi Sanneh _________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com. Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at http://profiles.msn.com. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html You may also send subscription requests to [log in to unmask] if you have problems accessing the web interface and remember to write your full name and e-mail address. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------