Guelleh, known by his initials “IOG”, has ruled the nation of about one million people for 27 years with an iron grip, leveraging its key location to turn it into an international military and maritime hub.
Its mere 23,000sq km host military bases and contingents from France, the US, China, Japan and Italy, generating substantial financial, security and political benefits.
Just over 256,000 voters are eligible to cast ballots from 3am GMT to choose between Guelleh, 78, and Mohamed Farah Samatar, leader of the Unified Democratic Center (CDU), a party with no seats in parliament.
Polling stations will close 12 hours later, with results expected shortly after.
Guelleh has plastered the capital Djibouti with campaign posters and drawn thousands to his rallies, while Samatar has struggled to gain support.
The national broadcaster aired one of Samatar’s rallies, with only a few dozen people present.
“I’m going to vote for Ismail Omar Guelleh because he has a good programme for young people. I don’t even know what his opponent looks like,” Deka Aden Mohamed, 38, told AFP.
“Samatar, I don’t like him,” said Mohamed Ali, a 51-year-old driver.
In the last presidential election in 2021, which the opposition largely boycotted, Guelleh secured more than 97% of the vote.
He has faced little opposition since succeeding the country’s first president, Hassan Gouled Aptidon, in 1999. He had been Aptidon’s chief of staff.
In 2005, he was re-elected unopposed.
While he had announced he would step down in 2026, a constitutional amendment in November removed the upper age limit of 75 for presidential candidates, clearing him to run again.
His candidacy is seen by some as offering “stability” in the troubled Horn of Africa region, but analysts say it is driven by the absence of a unanimously accepted successor. The health of the president has come under scrutiny.
Unemployment and debt
Despite the lopsided election, people told AFP they were eager to vote.
“It’s a duty to go vote,” said Yussuf Mohamed Hussein. “I’m going to vote for the president; Samatar, I don’t even know him.”
Around 70% of young Djiboutians are unemployed, and the country’s development has come at the cost of substantial debt, particularly to China.
Situated on the key Bab al-Mandab strait, which divides the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden and is one of the world’s busiest shipping routes.
Without agriculture to rely on, Djibouti depends on ports for 70% of its gross domestic product, with Ethiopia its main maritime outlet.
The nation is accused by human rights organisations of repressing dissent. Guelleh is accused of favouring his own majority Issa community, at the expense of the marginalised Afar minority.