Akufo-Addo Wins Second Term As Ghana's President | Foreign

President Nana Akufo-Addo of Ghana has been re-elected for a second term in the West African nation.

Akufo-Addo, who is the candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), defeated his main rival,John Mahama of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), as well as 10 other candidates.

The incumbent won 51.59 percent of the vote, a total of 6,730,413 votes, as announced by the nation’s election commission.

Mahama was second with 47.36 percent of the vote, or 6,240,889 votes.

Both leading candidates won eight each of the country’s 16 regions.

Meanwhile, there were reports of violence in many parts of the country regarded as one of West Africa’s most stable democracies.

This followed claims by the two leading candidates that they were winning based on their camps’ tallies.

Although observers have described the poll as generally peaceful, police said five people were killed in pockets of violence since Monday, when the votes were cast.

The Ghanaian Police Service noted that more than 60 separate violence-related incidents were recorded across Ghana in the course of polling.

“Twenty-one of the incidents are true cases of electoral violence, six of which involve gunshots resulting in the death of five,” Al Jazeera quoted a police statement as stating.

Akufo-Addo is 76 years old.