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Several thousand protest in Togo to call for presidential term limit

By Emile Kouton
Egypt An opposition supporter holds up a Togolese flag during a demonstration in Lome on November 28, 2014, calling for reforms to the constitution that would prevent the current president from running for another term.  By Emile Kouton AFP
NOV 28, 2014 LISTEN
An opposition supporter holds up a Togolese flag during a demonstration in Lome on November 28, 2014, calling for reforms to the constitution that would prevent the current president from running for another term. By Emile Kouton (AFP)

Lome (AFP) - Several thousand people protested in the Togolese capital on Friday to call for constitutional change that would bar President Faure Gnassingbe from seeking a third term of office in next year's vote.

The Gnassingbe family has run the small West African nation since the current president's father took power in 1967.

Friday's protest came a week after police in the capital Lome used teargas on opposition supporters who defied government orders not to march on the national assembly building.

The opposition had called for a massive protest on Friday, but the turnout was smaller than last week's demonstration.

"It is in Faure Gnassingbe's interest to rule out a third term in order to avoid problems in this country," said Zeus Ajavon, coordinator of Let's Save Togo, a coalition of opposition and civil society groups.

The opposition has been pushing for a change to the country's constitution, which would limit a president to two, five-year terms of office. There is currently no limit.

But Gnassingbe has ruled out any change and said that the constitution in force would be upheld. Lawmakers had previously rejected a reform bill.

The president took over from his father, General Gnassingbe Eyadema, who died in 2005 after 38 years in charge of the country of some six million people.

The opposition disputed Faure Gnassingbe's election wins in 2005 and 2010 and have long called for institutional and political changes to be made, so far without success.

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