PARIS, Dec 19, 2023 (BSS/AFP) - Could Donald Trump make a comeback? Will
anyone in Russia challenge Vladimir Putin?

With half the world heading to the polls in 2024, and some 30 countries
electing a president, here are five key elections to watch:

- Trump-Biden rematch? -

On November 5, tens of millions of Americans will choose a president in a
contest which could keep incumbent Joe Biden in power until the age of 86.

Poll after poll shows that a majority of voters think the gaffe-prone
Democrat is too old to be commander-in-chief, despite his likely rival, ex-
president Donald Trump making similar slip-ups at 77.

Disinformation looks set to be a feature of the campaign, a hangover from the
last foul-tempered contest which ended with Trump supporters storming the US
Capitol to try to halt the certification of Biden's victory.

Trump goes into the Republican party nomination contest the clear favourite,
despite multiple criminal trials hanging over him.

Biden's campaign suffered another blow after the Republican-led House of
Representatives voted in December to open a formal impeachment inquiry into
whether he profited unduly from his son's foreign business deals while he was
vice-president under Barack Obama.

- Putin eyes six more years -

A newly-confident Russian President Vladimir Putin, energised by his troops'
success in holding their positions in Ukraine two years into the war, is
hoping to extend his 24-year rule by another six years in March elections.

On December 8 he announced he is running for a fifth term, which would keep
him in power until 2030.

In 2020 he had the constitution amended to allow him to theoretically stay in
power until 2036, which could potentially see him rule for longer than Joseph
Stalin.

With the war in Ukraine used to lock up or silence dissenters and opponents,
there is little chance of anyone standing in his way.

His long-time nemesis Alexei Navalny is serving a 19-year jail sentence.

- Modi's great power play -

Nearly one billion Indians will be called on to vote in April-May when the
world's most populous nation goes to the polls in an election in which Prime
Minister Narendra Modi and his nationalist BJP party are seeking a third
term.

Modi's political career and success have been based on support from India's
one-billion-plus Hindus and, critics say, stoking enmity toward the country's
large Muslim minority.

Despite a crackdown on civil liberties on his watch, he goes into the vote
the clear favourite, with his supporters crediting him with boosting his
country's standing on the global stage.

- EU test for populists -

The world's largest transnational poll in June will see more than 400 million
people eligible to vote in the European Parliament election.

The vote will be a test of support for right-wing populists, who have the
wind in their sails after the victory of Geert Wilders' anti-Islam, anti-EU
PVV Freedom Party in November's Dutch elections and last year's win for
Giorgia Meloni's far-right Brothers of Italy.

Brussels can take heart however from Poland, where former European Council
president Donald Tusk has returned to power on a solidly pro-EU platform.

- First Mexican woman president? -

A leftist former mayor of the capital and a businesswoman with Indigenous
roots are both vying to make history in Mexico in June by becoming the first
woman president of a country with a tradition of machismo.

Former Mexico City mayor Claudia Sheinbaum is running on behalf of outgoing
President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador's Morena party.

Her outspoken opponent Xochitl Galvez has been selected to represent an
opposition coalition, the Broad Front for Mexico.