THE Democratic Republic of Congo’s election commission has scolded the Catholic church for saying its data show a clear winner in Sunday’s presidential election, asserting that the announcement could incite an “uprising”.
The church has called on the electoral commission to publish the true results in “respect of truth and justice”.
The church, which deployed some 40,000 electoral observers in all polling centres, cannot say publicly who the clear winner appears to be, as Congo’s regulations forbid anyone but the electoral commission to announce results.
The commission accused the church of violating the regulations.
Observers have reported multiple irregularities as this vast, mineral-rich central African country voted for a successor to departing president Joseph Kabila.
This could be Congo’s first peaceful, democratic transfer of power since independence from Belgium in 1960.
IN Thailand, a tropical storm has buffeted coastal areas on Thailand’s east coast, knocking down trees and utility poles and flooding roads.
One person was reported dead and another missing after a fishing boat with a crew of six capsized in high waves. But Tropical Storm Pabuk has caused less damage than had been feared during the country’s high tourist season.
More than 6100 people in four provinces were evacuated before the storm hit.
Winds reached 40mph by late afternoon, down from 47mph when it hit land shortly after noon.
Warnings continued of strong wind and waves 10ft to 16ft high in the Gulf of Thailand and 6ft to 10ft in the Andaman Sea. It advised all ships to stay ashore and warned of storm surges on the Gulf coast.
MEANWHILE, US president Donald Trump has dismissed the prospect of being impeached.
“How do you impeach a president who has won perhaps the greatest election of all time, done nothing wrong” and has had the “most successful two years of any president,” Trump tweeted.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has been cautious about whether her new Democratic majority would impeach Trump, but two representatives, Brad Sherman and Al Green, already introduced impeachment articles on Thursday, the first day of the new Congress.
AND finally, Durham University scientists in England have provided badly needed feel-good news, after running simulations of the the Milky Way’s movement over the next 2.5 billion years.
They have predicted that a satellite galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud, will collide with the Milky Way in a devastating smash which could propel our solar system into outer space.
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