Djibouti’s veteran leader Ismail Omar Guelleh won the country’s presidential election with 97.8 percent of the vote, according to official results on Saturday.

Guelleh won his sixth term at the helm, beating his sole opponent Mohamed Farah Samatar, a little known figure by the general public who secured just 2.2 percent of the vote, according to interior ministry figures.

The long-term president won Friday’s presidential election with 97.8 percent of the vote, according to official results.

“Re-elected”, the Guelleh declared in a social media post ahead of the official results, after early results gave him a huge lead.

A long-term leader

The 78-year-old has ruled the tiny nation of one million people for 27 years with an iron grip.

He has made his name leveraging Djibouti’s key location to turn it into an international military and maritime hub. Its 23,000 square kilometres (8,900 square miles) hosts military bases and contingents from France, the United States, China, Japan and Italy, generating substantial financial, security and political benefits.

Guelleh won the last election in 2021, boycotted by most of the opposition, with more than 97 percent of the vote.

He had announced he would step down this year but a constitutional amendment in November removed the upper age limit of 75 for presidential candidates.

Just one opposing candidate

Some polling stations stayed open an hour later because of delays opening at the start of the day.

But few people in Djibouti doubted who would win.

Amid heavy security, Guelleh, widely known by his initials IOG, voted before noon at City Hall alongside his wife, while Samatar cast his ballot earlier.

“By the grace of God, we have arrived here, and we hope that this will end in victory,” Guelleh told reporters.

Guelleh has plastered the capital with campaign posters and drew thousands to his rallies, while Samatar has struggled to gain support. The national broadcaster aired one of Samatar’s events, with only a few dozen people present.

Samatar is the little-known leader of the Unified Democratic Centre (CDU), a party with no seats in parliament.

“I’m going to vote for Ismail Omar Guelleh because he has a good programme for young people. I don’t even know what his opponent looks like,” Deka Aden Mohamed, 38, told AFP.