The "Yes" vote in The Democratic Republic of the Congo's referendum on a post-war constitution appeared to take an early lead yesterday, according to UN radio citing early returns from the groundbreaking poll.

Sunday's vote on whether to accept a proposed constitution was the first independent election to be held in the Congo for over 40 years, a period during which the vast central African country has suffered wars and chaos.

Adoption of the constitution is intended to pave the way to national elections next year and President Joseph Kabila has warned its rejection would be disastrous for this process.

The UN's Radio Okapi said out of an initial 650,000 ballots counted which represented just 3 percent of the total cast the "Yes" vote had obtained more than 70 percent.

"These figures need to be taken with precaution but they point significantly towards a 'Yes' vote," Okapi reported on its yesterday's morning news.

"(We have) 72 percent for the 'Yes' and 16 percent for the 'No'," the radio said, adding the figures were collected by its journalists as early results were pinned up at voting stations across the country.

The Independent Electoral Commission, the country's official election body, has not released any results so far, saying it was too early.

Sunday's poll, which extended into Monday in some areas to give everyone a chance to vote, passed off largely peacefully.

But there were several incidents of violence and intimidation by opposition supporters of a "No" vote, resulting in low turnout in some areas.

A baby and a woman died after they were crushed in separate stampedes in crowded voting booths in the east of the country on Sunday.

Analysts and observers expect it to take several days for the results to be sent in from some 40,000 voting stations across the Congo.

Decentralized system

"The results are coming in minute by minute," Apollinaire Malu Malu, president of the electoral commission, told reporters late on Monday after polls officially closed.

"But it would be hazardous to give out figures before having more statistics," he added.

The proposed constitution provides for a decentralized political system with provincial administrations responsible for local decision making and controlling 40 percent of public funds.

After decades of leadership under late President Mobutu Sese Seko, who was ousted in 1997, and two subsequent wars, the charter limits the president to two five-year terms. It also requires him to nominate a prime minister from the parliamentary majority.

If the constitution is passed, it will pave the way for local, parliamentary and presidential elections by mid-2006.

This process is in line with UN-brokered peace deals that ended Congo's last war, a five-year conflict that has killed some 4 million people, mostly from hunger and disease.

Initial turnout figures from the poll indicated voting levels were highest in the east of the Congo, where most of the fighting took place and the population bore the brunt of the war.

But opposition calls for a boycott, coupled with some cases of intimidation, reduced numbers of voters in the southern opposition strongholds of the Kasai provinces, as well as in some neighborhoods in Kinshasa.

(China Daily December 21, 2005)