AFP - A tense Haiti is awaiting the results of pivotal elections that will see a new leader tasked with rebuilding a nation shattered by a January earthquake and gripped by raging cholera.
The National Observation Council (CNO), a local election monitoring group financed by the European Union, estimated that ruling party candidate Jude Celestin would not make it through to a presidential run-off.
Former first lady Mirlande Manigat had 30 percent of the vote, popular musician Michel Martelly 25 percent and Celestin only 20 percent, according to CNO's unofficial estimate based on data from 15 percent of polling stations.
If no candidate garners more than 50 percent of the vote, a second round between the top two will be held on January 16.
Electoral officials are to release preliminary results later Monday or on Tuesday, but it remains unclear whether the announcement will provide the actual outcome of the polls. Final results have been promised by December 20.
More than a week has already passed since the November 28 presidential and legislative polls and thousands have chosen not to wait for the results, taking to the streets instead to denounce the elections as rigged.
Haiti has been plagued by dictatorships and political upheaval, and several past leaders have fled or been forced into exile, including Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Haiti's first democratically elected president.
President Rene Preval is legally barred from seeking a third term and backed ruling INITE (UNITY) party candidate Celestin, who is going out with his daughter and widely viewed as his handpicked protege.
A confidential US diplomatic cable dated June 2009 disclosed last week by the WikiLeaks website said Preval tried to "orchestrate" the political transition, fearing he may be forced into exile when he leaves office early next year.
"Arrest Rene Preval! Dismiss the Provisional Electoral Council!" protesters shouted on Sunday as they neared the presidential palace, which was destroyed by January's massive earthquake that killed 250,000 people.
The election campaign was marred by deadly political clashes, alleged assassination attempts and ugly riots in northern Haiti targeting UN peacekeepers accused of bringing in cholera.
Election day itself was chaotic -- several polling stations were trashed by mobs and many quake survivors had no identification papers -- but international monitors said the irregularities should not invalidate the polls.
Twelve of the 18 presidential contenders initially cried foul and called for the polls to be scrapped, but Manigat and Martelly later reversed their decisions and sounded confident about making it through to the second round.
An unexpected admission last week from INITE that Celestin may have lost spurred hopes that the dysfunctional, failing nation could experience a political watershed and manage a relatively peaceful transition of power.
Celestin, 48, had the full use of the INITE party machinery at his disposal for the campaign and his face beamed down from every corner of Port-au-Prince on election posters.
But opinion polls suggested he was not so popular on the street, where Preval, who rose to power as a champion of the poor, has been blamed for a slow response to the quake and a failure to tackle the roots of poverty.
Poll favorite Manigat, a respected 70-year-old academic and longtime opposition leader, is no stranger to the presidential palace, where she served as first lady for a few months in 1988 until her husband Leslie Manigat was ousted from office in a military coup.
Martelly, known to the masses by his stage name "Sweet Micky," is a 49-year-old performer of Haitian kompa music who has a fanatical following among Port-au-Prince's mostly young population.
Whoever does win faces the daunting task of rebuilding a traumatized nation of 10 million that was the poorest in the Americas even before the devastating earthquake, less than one year ago.
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