BANGUI, Central African Republic, Dec 28, 2025 (AFP) - The Central African Republic held elections Sunday, with Faustin-Archange Touadera widely tipped to remain president after a campaign in which he boasted of steadying a nation long plagued by conflict.

Some 2.3 million people are eligible to choose the country's president and legislators, as well as municipal and regional representatives.

About 30 people waited to cast votes at the city hall in the capital Bangui as polling opened. "I have never missed a vote in my life," said retired soldier Martin Dekonamkona. Voting closes at 1700 GMT.

After changing the constitution so he can seek a third term, Touadera is in pole position in a seven-strong field.

The 68-year-old president concluded his campaign with a rally in a Bangui stadium, before a large and enthusiastic crowd.

While there were no major incidents during the campaign, the most credible opposition figures, Anicet-Georges Dologuele and former prime minister Henri-Marie Dondra, were prevented from flying to the provinces to hold rallies.

There has been a significant deployment of police, army, and Wagner Group mercenaries on Bangui streets.

Since Touadera was first elected in 2016 in the middle of a civil war, the CAR has seen unrest ease despite feuds between armed groups and the government in some regions.

Part of the opposition called for a boycott of the poll they consider a sham. Critics accuse Touadera of clinging onto power in one of the world's poorest countries.

Touadera was last re-elected in 2020, in a vote marred by allegations of fraud and an uprising by six rebel groups.

The rebels were pushed back with the help of the Rwandan army and mercenaries from the Russian Wagner paramilitary group.

The CAR ballot, along with Guinea's presidential vote on Sunday, caps a packed year of elections across Africa.

- 'Orchestrated' rallies -

According to political scientist and civil society figure Paul Crescent Beninga, "orchestrated" rallies have taken place across the country to plant the idea that Touadera enjoys widespread support.

Images of the incumbent have flooded the capital, with neon signs, giant portraits and T-shirts with his face seen everywhere on the streets.

While Touadera held rallies in Bangui stadium, his top two critics had to make do with neighbourhood walkabouts and events in schools or their party offices.

Dologuele and Dondra also faced the prospect of being barred from standing over allegations they held another country's citizenship.

Touadera's 2023 constitutional change introduced the requirement that candidates be single-nationals.

Although courts rejected the bans, Dologuele, who previously ran for president in 2020, was stripped of his Central African passport in October even after giving up his French citizenship. That prompted him to file a complaint to the UN's human rights office.

"But despite their candidacies being approved, many ... remain sceptical about the point of voting and the transparency of the elections," said Beninga.

Touadera has pointed to his record on improving security and the paved roads, public lighting installed on major avenues and renovated rainwater drainage canals in the capital.

But life for many people in the CAR -- 71 percent of whom live below the poverty line -- remains precarious, with a lack of basic services, an absence of passable roads, widespread unemployment, poor training and a steadily rising cost of living.

Despite being pushed back, anti-government fighters are still at large on main highways, as well as in the east near the borders with war-battered Sudan and South Sudan.