Maldives president set for five more years
COLOMBO, Oct 17 (Reuters) Asia's longest-serving leader was set to extend his rule today as the sun-kissed resort nation of the Maldives voted in a referendum in which only President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom was standing.
Already in power for 25 years, Gayoom will easily win a sixth five-year term although it was unclear whether an unprecedented riot that rocked the country last month would cut into his customary, Soviet-style winning margin.
Turnout will be the real test of his popularity. In previous referendums in the tourism-dependent nation of 1,200 islands off India's southern tip, Gayoom has never received less than 90 percent of the vote.
Ballot boxes have been sent to the islands, but officials said that, because it takes time to collect them, results may not be known until Monday.
Voting, which ends at 1330 GMT, had gone ''very smoothly'' so far, one resident said.
But the referendum comes less than one month after the riot shattered the Maldives' peaceful international image, raising renewed calls for reform and charges of human rights violations.
Gayoom, first elected in 1978, has defended his country's brand of governance, saying it had brought strong growth for the white-sand islands that attract more than 400,000 visitors a year.
Following the September riot, sparked by the death of four inmates in a prison crackdown, Gayoom accused foreign media of a campaign to undermine the country's stability.
One target of the protesters was the Elections Division office, which was set on fire.
After Gayoom won a vote against three other candidates in the Majilis, or parliament, last month, there has been no campaign, but the pro-government media has run laudatory articles on him. ''He is the most honest man in the whole country, a man in public life merely to serve the interests of the people,'' said the Miadhu News on its Web site.
An anti-government Web site said political control was stifling economic development outside the capital and its surrounding islands, and keeping wealth concentrated in the hands of the elite.
''In the midst of unparalleled wealth in Male, the government's obsession with control and suppression of criticism has effectively prevented any comparable economic development outside the capital,'' said maldivesculture.com.
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