2002 Republic of the Congo presidential election

Presidential elections were held in the Republic of the Congo on 10 March 2002. They followed the country's second civil war (1997-1999), which returned Denis Sassou Nguesso to power, and a subsequent transitional period, in which a new constitution was written and approved by referendum in January 2002.

2002 Republic of the Congo presidential election

← 1992 10 March 2002 2009 →
Registered	1,733,943
Turnout	74.70%
Nominee Denis Sassou Nguesso Joseph Kignoumbi Kia Mboungou Party PCT–FDU UPADS Popular vote 1,075,247 33,154 Percentage 89.41% 2.76%
President before election Denis Sassou Nguesso PCT Elected President Denis Sassou Nguesso PCT

The election lacked meaningful opposition participation, as the main opposition leaders—particularly former President Pascal Lissouba of the Pan-African Union for Social Democracy (UPADS) and former Prime Minister Bernard Kolélas of the Congolese Movement for Democracy and Integral Development (MCDDI)—were in exile, prevented from returning to Congo by legal convictions and sentences that were handed down in absentia. The only important opposition figure left to contest the election was former Prime Minister André Milongo of the Union for Democracy and the Republic (UDR), but he withdrew a few days before the election, claiming that it would be fraudulent.

Sassou Nguesso, standing as the candidate of his own Congolese Labour Party (PCT) and a coalition, the United Democratic Forces (FDU), was overwhelmingly elected, receiving nearly 90% of the vote against a field of minor challengers. He was sworn in on 14 August 2002 in a ceremony at the Palace of Congress in Brazzaville in the presence of seven other African heads of state.^[1]