Waving flags and chanting Islamic slogans, crowds at a Khartoum soccer stadium cheered Bashir as he promised economic development and education under his National Congress Party, which has dominated Sudan politics for more than 20 years.

Introducing Bashir, a Sudanese singer sang odes insulting the International Criminal Court prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo, who last year won an ICC arrest warrant against Bashir for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Sudan´s Darfur region.

The presidential and legislative elections, due to be held in April, have already been delayed several times. But if all goes to plan, they will be the oil-producing country´s first full, multi-party vote in almost quarter of a century.

The elections were promised in a 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement that ended more than two decades of civil war between north and south Sudan. They will precede a referendum in the south of the country on independence to be held in January 2011.