Djibouti Vote: Guelleh poised to extend 27-year rule

Djibouti’s leader Ismail Omar Guelleh held his final campaign rally on Wednesday ahead of Friday’s presidential election.

Facing a divided and largely silenced opposition, Guelleh is expected to extend his 27-year rule of the strategically located Horn of Africa nation.

Speaking to a packed and enthusiastic crowd, Guelleh urged citizens to come together:

"For the country to move forward, we must be united. All of you, regardless of your party or organisation, the essential thing is that we are Djiboutians, brothers and sisters, united.”

Since taking office in 1999, Guelleh has ruled with an iron fist and casts himself as a guarantor of stability. He’s also turned the strategically located nation into an international military hub.

"We have other countries, Ethiopia, Somalia, there’s war. But in our country, there is unity. I love our president,” supporter Adburaman Hassan said at the rally.

Strategically located on the Bab al-Mandab strait, Guelleh has turned Djibouti into an international military and maritime hub, home to the only permanent US military base in Africa and France's largest base on the continent. China, Japan and Italy also have troops in the country.

But rights groups say Guelleh has repressed dissenting voices and press freedom. Critics have called Friday’s vote a “masquerade” with a "foregone conclusion."

The clear favorite to win, 78-year-old Guelleh’s poor health could prevent him from seeing out his sixth term.