International
Former President Mahama won the Ghanaian presidential elections with 56.55% of the vote
The former president and leader of the Ghanaian opposition, John Dramani Mahama (2012-2017), won the presidential elections last Saturday by achieving 56.55% of the votes, according to the results published this Monday by the Electoral Commission.
Mahama, leader of the center-left Democratic National Congress (NDC), prevailed over his main rival, the country’s vice president, Mahamudu Bawumia, of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP, center-right), who won 41.61% of the vote.
At an event in the capital, Accra, the president of the Electoral Commission, Jean Mensa, said that the results correspond to 267 of the country’s 276 electoral constituencies.
However, Mensa remarked that, even if Bawumia got all the votes in the remaining nine constituencies, that would not change the victory by an absolute majority of the former 66-year-old.
“We have carried out fair, credible, transparent and peaceful elections,” said the president, adding that participation stood at 60.9%.
Bawumia already admitted defeat in the elections on Sunday and congratulated the former president as the winner of elections marked by the country’s serious economic crisis.
“The data from our own internal compilation indicate that the former president, his excellency John Dramani Mahama, has won the elections decisively,” said the 61-year-old vice president in a message addressed to the nation.
Bawumia promised Mahama his “full support in the transition process” and indicated that the NDC has also won the parliamentary elections.
“I make this concession speech before the official announcement of the Electoral Commission to avoid more tensions and preserve the peace of our country. It is important that the global investment community continues to believe in the peaceful and democratic character of Ghana,” the vice president said.
Four-year term
About 18.7 million voters, out of a total population of about 35 million people, were called to elect the president and 276 members of the unicameral Parliament for a four-year term, in the ninth general elections since the country became a multiparty democracy in the 1990s.
The outgoing president, Nana Akufo-Addo, did not compete after completing the maximum of two terms allowed by the Constitution.
The day was generally spent in peace, with the exception of some isolated events, such as a shooting in the north of the country that caused one death and one injury by an electoral dispute.
Twelve candidates participated in the race for the presidency, but the competition really focused on Bawumia and Mahama.
Bawumia aspired to a victory with which the NPP would have achieved an unprecedented third consecutive term in the government, and to make history as Ghana’s first Muslim president.
Ghana, a major producer of gold and cocoa, is facing its worst economic crisis in years, with a very high public debt that has forced this West African country to apply for a loan of 3 billion dollars from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Bawumia, an economist by profession, blamed during the election campaign the covid-19 pandemic and the effects of the war between Russia and Ukraine as causes of the slowdown in the national economy, which was “going well” before 2020.
In the campaign, Mahama, who lost the 2016 and 2020 elections to Akufo-Addo, argued that economic challenges and high unemployment – especially among young people – show that “Ghana is at a crossroads and needs a restart.”
The vote of Ghana, one of the most stable democracies on the African continent, had electoral observation missions from international organizations such as the African Union (AU) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECEWAS).
In its preliminary report on the elections published on Monday, the AU mission concluded that “the electoral process in general was in accordance with regional and international standards, which reinforced Ghana’s democratic credentials.”
International
Indigenous candidate Leonidas Iza predicts a new social explosion if there is no change in Ecuador
The presidential candidate of Ecuador for the indigenous movement, Leonidas Iza, who was part of the wave of protests of 2019 and who led that of 2022, reveals himself as an “anti-system” politician in the face of “a corrupt system” that he intends to reformulate to relieve the impoverished, because he predicts a new social explosion if there is no change in the Government to meet popular demands.
Iza, 42, is the candidate of Pachakutik, the political arm of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (Conaie) that he himself presides over, and with which he was at the forefront of the 2022 wave of protests against the government of conservative President Guillermo Lasso, where he was arrested and even labeled a “terrorist.”
“I am one of those who has never lost the ability to be outraged when governments have had policies against their own citizens,” Iza, a native of the Andean province of Cotopaxi, said in an interview with EFE.
“I am not against the private sector, I am against those who do not pay taxes and those who come to the Government only to defend their companies,” said the candidate in reference to the last two presidents (Lasso and Daniel Noboa).
“We fight for social justice, not to be violent. It is a reaction to the injustice to which we have been subjected,” he said.
For Iza, who represents the anti-extractivist left of Ecuador, the country has “a corrupt system, a health system that does not work, a deficient and unfair economic system, and public services that are not helping citizens.”
“And that’s what we want to change. We won’t be able to do it overnight, but the State can give relief to the people,” the candidate said.
To do this, it proposes to fight against tax evasion, which amounts to about 7.5 billion dollars a year, and also against corruption, which is estimated at about 3 billion dollars per year, to balance public accounts without having to follow the current credit program with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that asks to cut public spending and raise taxes.
He also aimed to increase agricultural productivity, as well as boost tourism to go from 1 to 3 million visitors a year, and anticipated that he will regulate small and artisanal mining to avoid illegal mining but will not allow large-scale mining because it considers that it can contaminate the country’s large river basins.
Iza anticipated that he will not pay the external debt as long as there are “guaguas (children, in Kichwa) who have no education and are dying of hunger, and colleagues who are dying for lack of health.”
“We will tell the IMF and the other multilaterals that we are going to pay, but first we are going to solve the structural problem we have at the moment: education, health and minimum conditions for security,” he warned.
In that sense, Iza pointed out that “the strength of a popular reaction in the streets is accumulating” that must be resolved by whoever is elected. “Knowing my country, which has been on the streets all its life, there will be a popular reaction if (the discomfort) is not resolved in the following months,” he reiterated.
“The option that understands the people is us, and not the sectors that have always been in the Government,” said Iza, who avoided pointing out whether that reaction will reach the dimensions of the strong protests of 2019 and 2022, both led by the indigenous movement.
In this electoral campaign, Iza has left his distinctive Andean red poncho to put on the bulletproof vest in the face of the persistent wave of violence of organized crime that the country is experiencing, because he warned that the “war” that Noboa declared to the criminal gangs has not worked because its leaders are still free.
Faced with this, he promised “a hard hand for all” and recalled that “state institutions must suffocate everyone (criminals)”.
The candidate also advocated deepening international cooperation: “there must be a responsibility of all countries (producers, consumers and drug transit), especially in the region (of Latin America)”.
Asked if Ecuadorian society is ready to have an indigenous president of rural origin, Iza sees himself with popular support to face “the most reactionary sectors that have support in racism and stigmatization.”
International
Deaths in a hotel fire in a ski resort in Turkey rise to 69
The fire that occurred this morning in a 12-story hotel in a ski resort in northwestern Turkey claimed at least 69 deaths, in addition to causing fifty injuries, according to the latest assessment of the country’s authorities.
The fire originated around 3.30 a.m. local time (0.30 GMT) in a hotel, built entirely of wood, in the Kartalkaya ski center, halfway between Istanbul and Ankara, with almost full occupancy.
The flames were extinguished after about ten hours of firefighters’ work and the authorities found the death of 66 people, in addition to rescuing 51 injured, compared to the 10 dead and 32 injured initially estimated.
The hotel, with 161 rooms, had an occupancy close to 90%, because these days are the winter school holidays in Turkey, says the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet.
The wooden construction and the location of the hotel at the foot of a ski slope, which only allows vehicle access from the front facade, made the intervention of firefighters difficult, the Turkish newspaper explained.
According to the television network NTV, about 300 people, including employees, were in the hotel at the time of the fire, the causes of which are still unknown.
International
Hamas calls for counterattack on Israeli soldiers during their incursion in the West Bank
The Islamist organization Hamas urged the Palestinians on Tuesday to intensify and support their militiamen in the clashes against the Israeli Army during the military incursion that began today in Yenin, in the north of the occupied West Bank.
“We call on the masses of our people in the West Bank and their revolutionary youth to mobilize and intensify the clashes against the (Israeli) occupation army at all points, and to work to thwart the extensive Zionist aggression against the city of Yenin.”
“This military operation launched by the occupation in Yenin will fail, as did all its previous military operations against our brave people and their tenacious resistance,” the Palestinian group said.
Since the beginning of the operation, nicknamed by the Army “Iron Wall”, at least seven Palestinians have died in Yenin and another 35 have been injured, according to data from the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
Hamas accused the forces of the Palestinian National Authority (ANP), President Mahmoud Abbas’ ruling party in the West Bank, of having left Yenin to allow the operation of Israeli troops, instead of defending the Palestinians.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended on Tuesday that the last assault launched by his forces against Yenin, in the north of the occupied West Bank, seeks to “eradicate terrorism.”
“This is another step towards the objective we have set ourselves: to strengthen security in Judea and Samaria (West Bank),” according to a statement released by its Office.
“We are acting systematically and decisively against the Iranian axis wherever it sends its weapons: in Gaza, Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, Judea and Samaria (West Bank),” concludes the Israeli president’s note.
The rail comes shortly after the start of the ceasefire in Gaza, which includes a weekly exchange of hostages in the Strip for Palestinian prisoners in Israeli prisons.
Following the release of the prisoners, the Army increased its presence in this occupied territory with seven companies, claiming to strengthen its “anti-terrorist efforts.”
The images recorded in Yenin show dozens of Army vehicles accessing the local refugee camp, which has also been bombed by Israeli aviation.
The incursions and attacks of Israeli forces in Yenin, considered a bastion of Islamist-like militias, were already constant but they worsened after the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023.
However, since mid-December it has been the security forces of the Palestinian National Authority (ANP), which governs small parts of the West Bank, that have led an offensive in this population, which until last Friday triggered armed fighting against the militiamen.
This exchange of fire has caused at least 15 people dead on both sides, including two minors.
The occupied West Bank is experiencing its greatest spiral of violence since the Second Intifada (2000-05), and in 2024 at least 491 Palestinians have died in the territory by Israeli fire, most of them militiamen from refugee camps, but also civilians, including at least 75 minors, according to EFE’s count.
So far this year, at least 24 Palestinians have already died in Israeli attacks, five of them minors.
Indigenous candidate Leonidas Iza predicts a new social explosion if there is no change in Ecuador
Deaths in a hotel fire in a ski resort in Turkey rise to 69
Hamas calls for counterattack on Israeli soldiers during their incursion in the West Bank
Tec de Monterrey honors one of its students for his contribution to nanotechnology in medicine
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Ecuador prison riot leaves at least 43 dead
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