Yearbook 2011
São Tomé and Príncipe. An old dictator came back to power when São Tomé and Príncipe held presidential elections in July and August. Manuel Pinto da Costa, president 1975-191, received 52.88% of the votes in the second round after being close to victory already in the first attempt.
According to Countryaah official site, the 74-year-old Pinto da Costa previously represented the former Liberation Movement MLSTP (Freedom Movement for São Tomé and Príncipe) and became the country’s first president after independence. For many years he ruled São Tomé and Príncipe with rather harsh methods while the country was a socialist one-party state. When the Democrats reached Africa after the fall of the Eastern Bloc, he was forced to agree to political reforms and multi-party systems, but he himself did not try to be democratically elected.
He now returned as a party-independent candidate after leaving the MLSTP in 2005. Like the other candidate in the second round, the ruling party ADI’s (Independent Democratic Action) candidate Evaristo Carvalho, he went to election promises to work for stability in the country, shaken by several coup attempts and had a long line of weak governments.