Using intimidation tactics and clever political machinations that disqualified one opposition party and caused another to refuse to participate, Eyadéma won the 1993 presidential elections with more than 96 % of the vote.

Despite allegations of electoral fraud, Eyadéma won 57 % of the votes in the 2003 elections, which international observers from the African Union described as generally free and transparent.

After taking power, Eyadéma won uncontested elections in 1972, 1979, and 1986.

Eyadéma officially won re-election in the June 1998 presidential election, defeating Gilchrist Olympio of the Union of the Forces of Change ( UFC ) with 52. 13 % of the vote according to official results, amid allegations of fraud and accusations of the massacre of hundreds of government opponents.

Subsequently, in by-elections that were held in constituencies where the results of the 1994 parliamentary election had been annulled, the Rally of the Togolese People ( RPT ) of President Gnassingbé Eyadéma won all three constituencies at stake, giving it and its allies a parliamentary majority and enabling it to form a new government without relying on Kodjo's Togolese Union for Democracy ( UTD ) party.

Emmanuel Bob-Akitani, the First Vice-President of the UFC, ran in place of Olympio ; Eyadéma won the election.

Previously, presidents had been limited to two five-year terms, and Eyadéma would have therefore been forced to step down after the 2003 election.

In 2002, in what critics called a ' constitutional coup ', the national assembly voted unanimously to change the constitution and allow Eyadéma to ' sacrifice himself again ' and run for a third term during the 2003 presidential elections.

With the removal of these limitations, however, Eyadéma was free to stand again and did so, winning the election on June 1 with 57. 78 % of the vote.

President Gnassingbé Eyadéma appointed Sama as Prime Minister on 27 June 2002, replacing Agbeyome Kodjo ; this move was said to be done as part of preparations for the parliamentary election that was held later in the year.

In 1998, he was again a candidate in the disputed June 1998 presidential election, receiving 34. 10 % of the vote according to official results, in second place behind Eyadéma.

Olympio was able to run in the June 1998 presidential election, placing second with 34 % of the vote, behind long-time President Gnassingbé Eyadéma, according to official results ; the UFC alleged fraud, however.

On August 19, 1998, Eyadéma accepted the resignation of Klutse and his government, but he reappointed Klutse on August 20 to head a new government,

In the early 1990s, the international community began putting pressure on Eyadéma to democratize, a notion he resisted with a few waves of his trademark iron fist.

The African leaders with close ties to France — especially during the Russo – American Cold War ( 1945 – 91 ) — acted more as agents of French business and geopolitical interests, than as the national leaders of sovereign states, such as Omar Bongo ( Gabon ), Félix Houphouët-Boigny ( Côte d ' Ivoire ), Gnassingbé Eyadéma ( Togo ), Denis Sassou-Nguesso ( Republic of the Congo ), Idriss Déby ( Chad ), and Hamani Diori ( Niger ).

Although Eyadéma attempted to suspend the conference, surrounding the venue with soldiers, he subsequently accepted the outcome.

Despite this, Eyadéma managed to remain in power with the backing of the army.

Eyadéma had an extensive personality cult, including, but not limited to, an entourage of 1, 000 dancing women who sang and danced in praise of him ; portraits which adorned most stores ; a bronze statue in the capital city, Lomé ; $ 20 wristwatches with his portrait, which disappeared and re-appeared every fifteen seconds ; and even a comic book that depicted him as a superhero with powers of invulnerability and super strength.

When Eyadéma died on February 5, 2005, Gnassingbé was immediately installed as President with support from the army.

Along with other opposition leaders, Kodjo pressured Eyadéma to hold a free and fair parliamentary election in 1994.

According to official results, he placed second behind long-time President Gnassingbé Eyadéma in the 2003 election, with 33. 68 % of the vote against 57. 78 % for Eyadéma.

officially received 38. 1 % of the vote on the latter occasion, losing to Faure Gnassingbé, son of the deceased Eyadéma, amidst opposition claims of a rigged vote.

In a 2004 article on personality cults, The Economist identified Togo's Gnassingbé Eyadéma as maintaining an extensive personality cult, to the point of having schoolchildren begin their day by singing his praises.

Although Jacques Foccart denied personal knowledge of the attempted coup after its failure, he did recognize that it had been backed-up by Gnassingbé Eyadéma ( Togo ), Houphouet-Boigny ( Ivory Coast ), Omar Bongo ( Gabon ) and Hassan II ( Morocco ), all allies of France.

Eyadéma claimed that the crash was not an accident and was in fact a conspiracy to kill him, plotted by imperialists who did not like his plan ( announced on January 10, 1974 ) to nationalize the important phosphate mining company, the ( CTMB or Cotomib ).

Upon his arrival at the airport in Lomé, he was greeted by Togolese President Gnassingbé Eyadéma.

* 24 April-Presidential elections in Togo return Faure Gnassingbe to power two months after he was installed by the military following the death of his father, Gnassingbé Eyadéma.

A son of President Gnassingbé Eyadéma, he was appointed to the government by his father, serving as Minister of Equipment, Mines, Posts, and Telecommunications from 2003 to 2005.

* Togolese presidential election, 2005: Three killed, amid claims of fraud in tense election in Togo to choose the successor to President Gnassingbé Eyadéma, hardline ruler for 38 years, from amongst Faure Gnassingbé, the 39-year-old son of the late leader, and several challengers led by Emmanuel Bob-Akitani.

They were called upon by President Gnassingbé Etienne Eyadéma to carry out the national public consultation campaign that led to the creation the single national political party, the Togo People's Assembly ( Rassemblement du Peuple Togolais-RPT ) on August 30, 1969.

The death of Eyadéma on February 5, 2005, was followed by the naming of his son, Faure, as president.

He then returned to Togo and was appointed by President Gnassingbé Eyadéma as Secretary-General of the Ministry of Finance in July 1967.

Mediation efforts by President Gnassingbé Eyadéma of Togo and President Seyni Kountché of Niger to resolve the conflict were unsuccessful and sporadic clashes continued into early 1975.

Klutse was then appointed as Prime Minister by Eyadéma on August 20, 1996.

He was sentenced to death twice in absentia by the regime of Gnassingbé Eyadéma.

Col. Étienne Eyadéma, a participant in the coup who later assumed the presidency in 1967 and held it until his death in 2005, claimed to have personally fired the shot which killed Olympio.

After Eyadéma died in office in February 2005, Olympio was chosen as the UFC candidate for the early presidential election that would be held as a result of Eyadéma's death.

* 1967 – Gnassingbé Eyadéma overthrows President of Togo Nicolas Grunitzky and installs himself as the new president, a title he would hold for the next 38 years.

President Gnassingbé Eyadéma, who ruled Togo under a one-party system, died of a heart attack on 5 February 2005.

The people of France and Togo were furious, and under their backlash Eyadéma gave in.

For many Togolese, there was little optimism for the future and a prevailing sense of déjà vu as Eyadéma extended his record as Africa's longest-serving ruler.

On February 5, 2005, Eyadéma died of a heart attack.

General Gnassingbé Eyadéma ( born Étienne Eyadéma, December 26, 1935 – February 5, 2005 < ref >) was the President of Togo from 1967 until his death in 2005.

At the time of his death, Eyadéma was the longest-serving ruler in Africa.

Étienne Eyadéma Gnassingbé was born on 26 December 1935 in Pya, a village in the prefecture of Kozah in the Kara Region, to a peasant family in the Kabye tribe.

A national conference was held in August 1991, electing Joseph Kokou Koffigoh as Prime Minister and leaving Eyadéma as merely a ceremonial president.

In March 1993, an unsuccessful attack was made on the Tokoin military camp, where Eyadéma was living ; several people were killed in the attack, including Eyadéma's personal chief of staff, General Mawulikplimi Ameji.