Around 15,000 people turned out to watch Ismail Omar Guelleh, for the ruling alliance, deliver his final speech in a lavish campaign.

Women in traditional Somali costume and carrying hand-painted umbrellas as a shield against the sun danced and sang beneath a giant poster of their candidate holding one arm aloft in triumph.

Across town around 5,000 people attended a boisterous rally for opposition candidate Moussa Ahmed Idriss.

His supporters distributed paper flyers with a campaign message to the crowd instead of the hundreds of campaign hats and T-shirts handed out at Ismail Omar's rally.

``Have confidence in us. We are going to win this vote,'' Moussa Ahmed told the crowd as his followers accused the ruling alliance of renting a crowd to swell the size of its rally.

But many Djiboutians and foreign observers say Ismail Omar will win the election and take over from outgoing veteran President Hassan Gouled Aptidon, who has ruled since independence from France in 1977.

The inability of the government to pay salaries on time or find jobs for Djibouti's youthful population will present a tough post-election challenge.

However, the tiny city state of just 600,000 remains a fragile oasis of stability next to Ethiopia and Eritrea, which are locked in a border war, and fractured and lawless Somalia.

Ismail Omar, for years a senior official in the president's office, urged his supporters to reject violence and said he would not be swayed by a lingering rebellion in the north of Djibouti among members of the country's ethnic Afar minority.

``We will not be intimidated by terrorist actions,'' he told the crowd.

Two people were killed and five injured on Sunday in a landmine explosion in the northern district of Tadjoura blamed on the rebellion, according to state radio.

Djibouti's population is divided between the Afar minority and Somali Issa clans, though both candidates are Issa.

With longtime ruler Hassan Gouled Aptidon set to retire, there is widespread skepticism that either candidate can make a difference in one of the world' s poorest countries.

Ismail Omar, Gouled' s nephew and designated successor, and independent candidate Moussa Ahmed hope to replace the outgoing president. Gouled has ruled the country since independence from France in 1977.

Nestled between chaotic Somalia and the warring countries of Eritrea and Ethiopia, this coastal country of 620, 000 people seems to be a regional haven of political stability. But poverty has become a serious threat.

Streets are empty at night because the electric company generate blew last month. Residents are angry and dismiss the candidates' promises to improve the economy as government deception or opposition propaganda.

" I don' t think either (candidate) would do anything, " said Hussein Umar, a 28-year-old porter.

Djibouti, a former haven for gunrunners and pearl divers, depends largely on assistance from France and income from its port on the Gulf of Aden.

The port, which is in heavy demand from landlocked Ethiopia since its war with coastal Eritrea erupted in May, is operating at full capacity for the first time since independence, officials said. Still, unemployment is estimated to be as high as 50 percent, according to U.S. figures.

Many of Djibouti' s unemployed young voters are looking to Ismail Omar to rescue the country with his promises of employment and economic reform.

" We hope Ismail can change our lives, " said Mouleh Aden Ali, an unemployed Djiboutian who was born during the year of independence.

Moussa Ahmed, who is considered an uninspiring compromise choice of opposition parties, is promising to fight corruption and uphold human rights in this country.

The two candidates also sparred on their views of how Djibouti should deal with Ethiopia.

Ismail Omar, who was born in Ethiopia 50 years ago, wants economic integration with Djibouti' s huge western neighbor. He also does not deny the opposition claim that he would be willing to form a federation with Ethiopia.

" If it is the people' s will, that is fine, " he said. " But I don' t think it will be necessary."

The opposition wants neutrality in the conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea and a halt in the flow of arms through the port to Ethiopia.

With government resources at his disposal, Ismail Omar, who served as police chief and a key adviser to Gouled, has campaigned across this sweltering volcanic country under the banner: " Together we will build for the future."

In the past week, Eritrea has invited 15 of the organizations to return, said Habte Abraha, an official with the Eritrean Relief and Refugee Commission.

Many aid groups abandoned Eritrea two years ago after the country imposed harsh restrictions on them.

The 11-month border war between Eritrea and Ethiopia has left 450,000 Eritreans homeless or unable to tend to their farms and businesses, according to the commission. Eritrea has a population of 3.5 million people.

Thousands who had lived in the war zone are now living in tent camps scattered about hillsides.

Another 55,000 ethnic Eritreans living in Ethiopia have been deported to Eritrea, leaving behind millions of dollars in money and assets.

The government hopes the aid groups will send money to buy grain and other food and will donate blankets, tents, medical supplies and trucks to the country's relief effort.

Eritrean officials said they would distribute the aid, but would allow donors to monitor the shipments to ensure that they reached their intended recipients.

Only a few international aid agencies have kept a presence in Eritrea since 1997, when government restrictions -- including a 38 percent income tax for expatriate staff -- made it difficult for the groups to operate.

Eritrean officials said they had made some changes in the restrictions but declined to provide details.

Tricia O'Rourke, a spokeswoman for Oxfam UK, said her group planned to visit Eritrea in the coming weeks to decide whether to return.

"We've approached them on a number of occasions about returning, and the response we've gotten since January has been positive," she said.

Officials with many of the other groups Eritrea said it had invited back said they were unaware of the invitation.

The only agencies currently aiding Eritrea are Norwegian Church Aid, Swedish Disaster Relief, Caritas Germany and UNICEF, Abraha said.

Eritrea and Ethiopia have been at war since May over areas of their barren 600-mile border, which was not clearly demarcated when Eritrea gained independence from Ethiopia in 1993.

Pastoralists in Ethiopia's Somali region have been migrating en masse in search of water for themselves and their livestock, the World Food Program (WFP) said in a statement.

``WFP's intervention is working to stave off a full-scale drought emergency,'' said Julia Lewis, the country director of WFP Ethiopia. ``If the current rainy season fails, we could have a major humanitarian crisis on our hands.''

The WFP will provide 8,000 tons of food in the month-long relief effort. Other aid agencies are trucking water to the worst affected regions.

The U.N. has also warned of a looming humanitarian disaster in neighboring Somalia if rains due this month fail.

A rebel group operating in the Ogaden region of eastern Ethiopia says it's holding a French aid worker taken captive there earlier this week.

In a statement issued in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, the Ogaden National Liberation Front, said the Frenchman -- who worked for the aid agency, Action Contre La Faim -- had been engaged in what it called inappropriate activities.

It gave no further details. Last year, a breakaway faction of the Ogaden National Liberation Front kidnapped an Austrian student on suspicion she was working as an informer for the Ethipian government.

It later released her.

Six lions and 30 hyenas have died in what the agency described as the worst fighting between beasts ever seen in Ethiopia.

The rival groups rest in their dens during the day but come out every sunset, roaring and howling, to continue their battle for supremacy.

Quoting local police, the Ethiopian News Agency said the fighting was continuing but that no people were in danger because the wild animals were far from any human settlement.

While lions are the natural world's dominant hunters, any single lion can be brought down by a small group of hyenas.

Both lions and hyenas steal each other's kills but lions are the more frequent poachers.