Algerians finished voting yesterday in a disputed presidential election, handing certain victory to Mr Abdelaziz Bouteflika, the military's choice, after six other candidates refused to participate in what they saw as a rigged affair.
The turnout - the only question hanging over the vote with Mr Bouteflika's challengers out of the way - was 60.25 per cent, state radio reported.
Mr Bouteflika, a former foreign minister, had said he would not accept the president's mantle unless a "large majority" of Algeria's 17.5 million voters turned out to vote.
"I want the Algerian people to express themselves clearly and with a large majority on the necessary change," he said, adding: "If the people want something else, I will go home."
When Mr Bouteflika's six rivals announced their withdrawal, citing proof of vote-rigging in early polling, they also said they would not recognise the outcome of the election if it went forward.
With a credible mandate far from assured for Mr Bouteflika, prospects remain dim that Algeria will soon pull out of an economic crisis marked by 30 percent unemployment, or see an end to civil strife that has claimed 100,000 lives, according to western estimates, since 1992, the year the military blocked electoral victory by the now-banned Islamic Salvation Front (FIS).
While the vote was under way yesterday, Mr Abdallah Djaballah, Mr Mouloud Hamrouche, Mr Ahmed Taleb Ibrahimi, Mr Youcef Khatib, Mr Mokdad Sifi and Mr Djamel Zenati, representing ailing FFS leader Mr Hocine Ait-Ahmed, met for several hours to plan a response to the government's decision to go ahead with the election despite their withdrawal.
They then issued a challenge to the legitimacy of the vote. A spokesman for the six candidates had said on Wednesday their supporters would take to the streets of Algiers today in protest.
If the authorities allow the march to go ahead, it will be the first street demonstration since the start of the election campaign. But it seems unlikely to be permitted.