Congo: Presidential aspirant Mokoko receives police summon on eve of poll

Congo presidential candidate General Jean-Marie Michel Mokoko said on Saturday that he had received fresh police summons to report to authorities on the eve of the election.

Mokoko however slammed the summons terming them as a bid to torpedo his hopes of contesting.

“It’s a trap, I will turn up for this meeting and then they will then arrest me. I do not want this to happen, I should benefit from the immunity and protection just like every other candidate campaigning in this election,” Mokoko said.

#Congo – #Mokoko de nouveau convoqué par la Direction générale de surveillance du territoire (DGST) #Congo2016 pic.twitter.com/uFJDEKeh2c

— ICIBRAZZA (@ICIBrazza) March 19, 2016

Since announcing his candidacy for the presidency in February, Jean-Marie Mokoko has been summoned several times by the General Directorate of Territorial Surveillance.

The former army chief is running against incumbent President Denis Sassou Nguesso, he faced police questioning last month after a video emerged on the internet allegedly implicating him in an attempted coup.

Mokoko’s campaign organisers have dismissed the video as fake and that it was shot sometime in the early 2000s but appeared shortly after he held his first campaign rally on February 13.

Having served as Congo’s military chief from 1987 to 1993, Mokoko is currently the special representative of the African Union Commission in the neighbouring Central African Republic.

Mokoko, who Saturday turned 69, was a longtime ally of Nguesso but on February 3 he announced his resignation as the president’s advisor on peace and security, a post he had held since 2005, according to AFP.

Sources say that the country’s current president, Nguesso, is considered the runaway favorite to secure another term in office after 92 percent of voters backed an October 2015 referendum to allow him to run for a third consecutive term in office.