DAKAR/GAO, Mali: Mali’s presidential hopefuls kicked off campaigning this week for a July 28 election intended to draw a line under a coup and an Uprising, despite concerns that a rushed poll may sow the seeds of future strife.

France, which sent 3,000 troops to Mali in January to halt an offensive by Al-Qaeda-linked militants, has pressed hard for a July poll, eager to see an elected government in place to negotiate with Tuareg rebels in the north and to reform a dysfunctional state that imploded last year.

From Mali’s northern desert to its leafy southern riverside towns, the candidates promised voters a stronger army, an end to graft and poverty and the reconciliation of a divided nation as they doled out T-shirts at rallies and houses, from mini-buses and under mango trees emblazoned with posters.

Western donors hope the election will lay the foundations for rebuilding a nation once seen as a model of democracy in turbulent West Africa. The French troops will remain in Mali to help ensure a peaceful vote.

Yet millions of voting cards must still be dispatched across a vast territory twice the size of France. Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced by the conflict and many more are still missing from outdated voter lists.

“The election risks being marred by such technical shortcomings, and with such a low rate of participation, that it could result in the election of a president deprived of the legitimacy necessary to lead a confused and weakened country back to stability and development,” think tank International Crisis Group said in an editorial in France’s Le Figaro paper. OSIWA, a foundation funded by financier George Soros to promote democracy in West Africa, echoed these concerns. Both groups have called for a delay to address technical problems and avoid a destabilizing challenge to the election result.

The government, under pressure from Paris, insists pressing ahead with the vote is the only way to kick-start a recovery. “The delay called for by some will not resolve the technical problems,” said President Traore.