Opposition Leader Leads But Faces Runoff

An opposition leader won the first round of presidential elections, but faces a runoff vote against the ruling party candidate, electoral officials said Sunday.

With 199 of 200 constituencies reporting, opposition leader John Agyekum Kuffuor had 48.4 percent of Thursday's vote, compared to 44.8 percent for Vice President John Atta Mills, the candidate favored by incumbent President Jerry Rawlings. Five other candidates took only a small percentage of the vote, Electoral Commissioner Kwadwo Afari-Gyan told reporters.

In Ghana, candidates need to win 50 percent of the vote to capture the presidency outright, without going to a second round.

Afari-Gyan said that even if a candidate was to take every vote in the last uncounted constituency, it would not be enough for anyone to reach 50 percent.

Rawlings, a popular president who has dominated the Ghanaian political scene for 20 years, has ardently campaigned for Mills. But the vice president's chances were weakened by a steep decline in recent years in the country's once-thriving economy, which has suffered from plummeting prices for cocoa and gold - Ghana's most important exports - and oil price hikes.

Kuffuor, a British-trained lawyer, had called for ``positive change'' during his campaign, arguing that repeated accusations of corruption and human rights abuse against Rawlings' government meant it was time for a wholesale change in power.

Ghana has changed dramatically since Rawlings staged his first coup, in 1979. Originally a brutal military dictator who ravaged Ghana's economy with nationalizations, the charismatic former fighter pilot evolved through the 1980s, embracing democratic and free-market ideals in the 1990s and becoming a darling of Western donors. The constitution prohibits him from seeking another four-year term.

Nearly 11 million voters were registered for Thursday's election, but turnout figures were not immediately announced.

The second round of elections must be held within three weeks. The new president is to take power on Jan. 7.