In his first public reaction to the declaration of the results of last Friday's presidential elections the leader of the main opposition UDP party, Lawyer Ousainou Darboe has said he does not accept the results of the elections. He said the IEC has not been in full control of electoral process. He accused the IEC of conniving with the APRC regime to rig the elections.

Mr. Darboe told a BBC journalist that intimidating press of armed but partisan soldiers, harassment and bending of the rules and regulations have contributed to deprive the process of a leveled playing field. Asked why he was always complaining after losing in elections, Mr. Darboe said in 1996 he was not alone in complaining about the freeness and fairness of the elections and that in 2001 he called President Jammeh to concede defeat. He was complaining now because he has seen what was happening on the ground this time around. He said only people out of the country and Jammeh's supporters would dismiss his claims as being unserious. Asked if he did not think the lack of opposition unity contributed to Jammeh's landslide victory, Mr. Darboe told BBC that he did not think so. Jammeh scored more than the sum of both opposition had so it does not naturally follow, was Mr. Darboe's response.

Asked what he was going to do now, Mr. Darboe said he was waiting till his Executive Committee is able to meet and discuss the matter. He however thought that a combination of legal and political options were available as possible courses of action.

Hon. Halifa Sallah of the NADD opposition also expressed his shock at the magnitude of Mr. Jammeh's electoral victory. He however was quick to point out that the Alliance, the rival opposition bloc of parties, lost more. He said they were only able to pull about 104 000 (27%) votes instead of the over 37% they had the last time. He however expressed his opinion that more time was needed to be able to figure out what went wrong.