However, today presidential election runoff likely to see the incumbent president Ibrahim Boubacar Keita (IBK) return to office despite criticism of his handling of the country's security crisis.

This will be the second time that the two candidates in today presidential runoff will be engaging in second round because it happened between them in 2013 faceoff which Keita won by a landslide over the former finance minister Soumaila Cisse. This year's campaign saw fierce attacks on his failure to dampen a wave of jihadist bloodshed and ethnic violence.

Keita, 73, was credited with 41.7 percent of the July 29 first-round vote while Cisse, 68, picked up 17.78 percent. Cisse insisted on Friday he could turn things around on polling day -- warning the status quo would only bring "chaos" in a "torn nation." Few Malians attended a string of planned marches and protests called for by opposition leaders in the capital Bamako ahead of the run-off.

Though, it is likely that the incumbent president IBK will win the runoff.