The party’s candidate, General Evariste Ndayishimiye, won over 68% of votes in the vote with the main opposition CNL party’s Agathon Rwasa getting 24%, according to the elections body, CENI.

The main opposition party on Thursday filed a petition at the Constitutional Court to contest the results of the vote citing fraud and irregularities.

“We deplore many irregularities with regard to the freedom and transparency of the electoral process as well as fairness in the treatment of certain candidates and voters,” said the President of the Burundi Conference of Catholic Bishops, Bishop Joachim Ntahondereye.

He added that the church “deplores in particular the coercion exercised on certain proxies to sign in advance the counting of the contents of the ballot boxes, the stuffing of some ballot boxes, the voting in place of deceased and refugees, multiple and therefore invalid proxies, the fact that there were in some polling stations voters who voted more than once”.

It also condemns “the exclusion of proxies and observers from the places where the votes are counted, the intimidation and coercion of some voters by administrative officials who accompanied them to the polling booths, the intrusion of unauthorised persons into the counting stations”.