Bhutan opposition wins majority
July 13, 2013
The official website of Bhutan's Election Commission says the People's Democratic Party (PDP) won 32 seats in the 47-member national assembly in Saturday's voting, with the ruling Peace and Prosperity Party (DPT) winning only 15 seats.
Both parties emerged as the two leaders following a primary vote back in May that saw four other parties eliminated.
The country's chief election commissioner, Kunzang Wangdi, said a total of 850 polling stations had been set up, many of them in remote mountain villages. About 400,000 people were eligible to cast their ballots in the polls.
In 2008, the DPT won the election by a landslide and won the first round of this year's polls with 45 percent of the vote.
Among the issues said to be foremost in the minds of the kingdom's voters are rising fuel prices, after neighboring India cut subsidies on cooking gas and kerosene to Bhutan. The country has also been struggling under the effects of a credit crunch, another factor that has hurt the popularity of the government.
Bhutan's king gave up the monarchy's centuries-old absolute power in 2008, allowing the introduction of democracy to the Himalayan kingdom, which didn't introduce television until 1999.
Official results of the election will be announced on Sunday.
hc, pfd/jr (Reuters, AFP, AP, dpa)