* “World’s highest country” on political knife-edge
* Fears of repeat of 1998 fighting
* Army promises not to get involved
By Ed Cropley
JOHANNESBURG, May 25 (Reuters) – Voters in the highland
African kingdom of Lesotho go to the polls on Saturday in a
wide-open election that analysts say could end up without a
clear result, as happened in 1998 when South Africa had to send
in troops to quell major civil unrest.
Campaigning has been peaceful but a lack of opinion polls,
and Prime Minister Pakalitha Mosisili’s decision in February to
quit the ruling party and go it alone under the banner of the
new Democratic Congress (DC) party, have kept the landlocked
nation’s two million people on tenterhooks.
South African pop stars have helped draw large crowds to
political rallies, livening up what is normally a sleepy
backwater known mainly for being entirely surrounded by South
Africa and having the continent’s best cross-country skiing.
“It has brought a lot of excitement on the part of the
people. We think there will be a high turnout because people are
very interested to see what is going to happen,” former Malawi
President Bakili Muluzi, head of a Commonwealth observer team,
told Reuters.
Results are expected to trickle into the capital, Maseru, on
Sunday, and are most likely to leave Mosisili’s DC at the front
of the pack to form a new government but without a clear
majority, analysts say.
Continued…
