Cape Verde's main opposition party has won parliamentary elections with 46 percent of the vote, according to provisional results published overnight Sunday to Monday.
The national electoral commission said the African Party for the Independence of Cape Verde (PAICV) secured 33 of the 72 seats in the National Assembly in Sunday's election.
The results are based on 98.1 percent of polling stations.
PAICV leader Francisco Carvalho has already claimed victory and will become prime minister as leader of the largest party in parliament.
He will replace Ulisses Correia e Silva, who had headed the government for 10 years.
"Cape Verdeans received my party's message well about a Cape Verde for all and that it was time to change course and build a new Cape Verde," said Carvalho, who is also mayor of the capital, Praia.
The PAICV could win at least 37 seats and secure an outright majority in parliament, once all the results are counted.
Silva, who had been trying for a third term in office, accepted that his centre-right Movement for Democracy (MpD) had lost and said he had called Carvalho to congratulate him.
"These results do not correspond to the goals the MpD had of winning the elections and continuing to govern the country," he added.
Cape Verde, an archipelago of 550,000 inhabitants in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, lies some 600 kilometres (380 miles) off the coast of Senegal.
A former Portuguese colony until 1975, it has been seen as a model of democracy in Africa.
Since the first free elections in 1991, the country has enjoyed relative calm with no electoral violence, despite two, five-year periods of political cohabitation between different parties heading the government and presidency.
The country, however, faces significant social challenges, including poverty and youth unemployment.
Presidential elections are due to be held in November. The incumbent, Jose Maria Neves, who is backed by the PAICV, is hoping for a second, five-year term.
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