On 28 February, citizens of Lesotho voted in parliamentary and presidential elections. These were snap elections, called two years ahead of time, and were designed to drag the country out of the political and constitutional crisis which had left its government crippled for the last year. They were meant to signal a fresh start for Basotho democracy - and, from the perspective of most observers, they did.
'Based on its observations, the [Southern African Development Community] Electoral Observation Mission [SEOM] concludes that the 2015 National Assembly Elections in the Kingdom of Lesotho were peaceful, transparent, credible, free and fair, thus reflecting the will of the people of the Kingdom of Lesotho,' said South Africa's Foreign Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, who led the SEOM.
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