Maduro re-elected as Venezuelan President
Caracas, May 21: Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro has won the election, claiming a second six-year term, in a vote marred by an opposition boycott and alleged foul play, media reported on Monday.
With more than 90 per cent of the votes counted on Sunday, 55-year-old Maduro had 67.7 per cent, 5.8 million votes, the BBC reported quoting National Electoral Council chief Tibisay Lucena as saying.
The main opposition candidate, Henri Falcon won 21.2 per cent, 1.8 million votes, she said. Falcon rejected the result soon after the polls closed, saying, "We do not recognise this electoral process as valid. We have to have new elections in Venezuela."
The early reports said turnout for the controversial vote was unusually low, about 46 per cent of the electorate.
Falcon had earlier alleged that the vote had been rigged in Maduro's favour, by abuse of the scanning of state-issued benefits card, used for accessing food.
Government officials said the polls were "free and fair" but most of the opposition had joined a boycott.
The elections were supposed to be held in December 2018, but the National Constituent Assembly, made up exclusively of Maduro's supporters, brought them forward.
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Pakistan reports two more polio cases. Total tally now 52
ISLAMABAD: At least two more cases of poliovirus were reported in Pakistan, taking the number of infections to 52 so far this year, a report said on Friday.
“The Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication at the National Institute of Health has confirmed the detection of two more wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) cases in Pakistan," an official statement said.
The fresh infections — a boy and a girl — were reported from the Dera Ismail Khan district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province.
“Genetic sequencing of the samples collected from the children is underway," the statement read. Dera Ismail Khan, one of the seven polio-endemic districts of southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, has reported five polio cases so far this year.
Of the 52 cases in the country this year, 24 are from Balochistan, 13 from Sindh, 13 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and one each from Punjab and Islamabad.
There is no cure for polio. Only multiple doses of the oral polio vaccine and completion of the routine vaccination schedule for all children under the age of five can keep them protected.
