Mali held its presidential election on Sunday, amid the hope that the new head of state will help better the lives of citizens desperate for change.

"I can't tell for whom I will vote, but I believe that I selected the one who can bring peace and development for the nation, and attach greater importance to education and sanitation," said Santei, a man in his early 30s.

According to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), voting finished at 6 PM (15:00 GMT) and the ballots have been deposited in boxes placed at more than 20,000 polling stations around the country.

INEC's statistics said 6,884,524 of the country's population of just over 13 million had registered for the election, with 617,611 registered voters living abroad.

Mali is among the poorest countries in the world, with 65 percent of its land area desert or semi-desert and income drastically unequally distributed. About 10 percent of the population is nomadic and some 80 percent of the labor force is engaged in farming and fishing.

Economic activity is largely confined to the area irrigated by the Niger, and industrial activity is concentrated on processing farm commodities.

Though desperately poor, Mali has managed to be a success story for democracy in a turbulent corner of Africa.

The country slid into dictatorship after gaining independence from France in 1960, but then a 1991 coup led to elections the next year.

The incumbent President Amadou Toumani Toure, known popularly by his initials "ATT," seized control in 1991, organized polls and handed over power to elected president Alpha Oumar Konare the following year.

ATT won presidential elections in 2002 and has made housing, roads, and modernizing the country's agriculture his priorities. He is running for a second five-year term, being challenged by seven rivals, including one woman.

ATT, 59, was warmly welcomed Sunday morning by his supporters at a polling station set in an airbase located in Bamako, the capital. When he struggled out of the way to the No. 167 ballot box, clustered round by his bodyguards, supporters and reporters, children shouted "ATT! ATT!" and the supporters applauded boisterously.

Before the election, ATT had been touring Mali to highlight the numerous agriculture, infrastructure, health, and work projects that he has initiated. He promised to raise the country's cereal production to 10 million tons by 2012 from around 3 million if he is reelected.
 
Campaigning under the slogan "Takokelen," which means "win in the first round" in the local Bambara language, ATT has pledged to build new hospitals, schools, and roads, recruit more civil servants and push economic growth to an average 7 percent.

Critics accuse ATT of lacking any big political ideas, dismissing him as "head of a building site" rather than "head of state" for his focus on local development projects. However, this strategy has won him admiration abroad.

His rivals, including Mali's first female candidate and several ex-ministers, have campaigned along similar lines, vowing to lift the country out of poverty.

Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, a former prime minister and head of the National Assembly, is widely considered ATT's most serious rival. Keita, 62, ran for presidency in 2002, coming third in the first round before backing ATT in the run-off vote. He has also made fighting poverty and widening access to basic services such as safe water, healthcare, and education the cornerstones of his campaign.

Sidibe Aminata Diallo, chairperson of Rally for Education and Sustainable Development, is the first female candidate to contest a presidential election in Mali.

Diallo, 50, is a professor of development and town planning at Bamako University and has worked for the UN Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization. She has made the environment and boosting employment in provincial towns her main campaign pledges.

With a stable democratic government in place since 1991, landlocked Mali has fared better than many neighboring countries in economic terms. Thanks to strong gold prices and a healthy tourist sector, the economy grew by 5 percent in 2006.

As the third biggest gold producer in Africa after South Africa and Ghana, Mali's gold output is forecast to rise to 64.15 tons in 2007 from 62.38 tons in 2006 as new mining operations outpace a slowdown at mature mines, figures from the Mines Ministry show.

However, Mali has remained at the bottom of the United Nation's Human Development Index, ranking 175 out of 177 countries in 2006.

"Maybe it is the last time for me to vote, so I would like to help select a big leader out," said Tagnion, a 101 year old woman, who is considered the oldest voter for the election.

With her 58-year-old grandson's help, she staggered to the same polling station where ATT voted on Sunday.

"It is obviously not so easy for me to vote," she said. "But I must do it."

A candidate needs to garner 51 percent of the vote to avoid a run-off.

(Xinhua News Agency April 30, 2007)