President Mahinda Rajapakse has taken the lead in Sri Lanka's tense election, officials said on Wednesday, but the opposition said it was on course for power despite a row over its candidate's eligibility.

Election officials said Rajapakse, who is being challenged by his former army chief Sarath Fonseka, had won over 60 percent of the vote with about one-tenth of the ballots counted.

NONE The winner was set to be announced around noon (0630 GMT) on Wednesday by Election Commissioner Dayananda Dissanayake.

The island nation's presidential vote yesterday was the first since Rajapakse and Fonseka engineered the final defeat of Tamil Tiger separatists last year after three decades of civil war.

The campaign's vitriolic nature, coupled with warnings from the opposition of protests, fraud and state-backed coups, had raised fears that the loser might reject the result and foment new unrest instead of a peace dividend.

But Media Minister Anura Priyadharshana Yapa said Rajapakse, who like Fonseka is a member of Sri Lanka's dominant Sinhalese community, was "heading for a historic victory".

The first official results showed Rajapakse getting 723,362 votes against 460,725 for Fonseka. An estimated 9.85 million people voted in all.

"Personally, the outcome is better than what I expected," Yapa said.

Fonseka trumped in home constituency

Fonseka lost in his home constituency of Ambalangoda in the island's south with Rajapakse getting 33,488 votes against his 19,191, according to the official count.

NONE Late on Tuesday, the government said it would challenge Fonseka's legitimacy in court after the former armed forces chief admitted that he was not listed on the 2008 register used for the election.

The government said this made Fonseka ineligible to be president, despite a strong statement from the independent election commissioner saying the issue would not prevent the 59-year-old military man from taking office if he won.

"What the election commissioner has expressed is merely an opinion, but the courts have the ultimate authority to interpret the law," Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama told reporters late Tuesday.

NONE Four people were killed and more than 1,000 election-related incidents were reported to police in the run-up to Tuesday's contest.

Opposition leader Ranil Wickremesinghe, whose disparate forces backed Fonseka on an anti-corruption platform against the president's alleged family nepotism, said the election had been "by and large" peaceful.

There were a number of violent incidents during voting, including bomb attacks in the northern Tamil stronghold of Jaffna, which monitors said had deterred some people from voting.

But Wickremesinghe said turnout overall was high "and that will ensure that Sarath Fonseka will be president".

No legal challenge  

Briefing reporters late Tuesday, Wickremesinghe dismissed any legal challenge by the government against Fonseka's candidacy.

"The Supreme Court has said you can contest without casting a vote as recently as last December in regional elections," he said.

NONE Fonseka said he had sent papers to be registered at the time the last electoral roll was made in June 2008 and could not explain his omission.

Rajapakse as commander-in-chief and Fonseka, his army chief, defeated the Tamil Tigers in May last year, ending a 37-year separatist conflict that left 80,000-100,000 dead, according to UN figures.

The military campaign made both men national heroes in the eyes of the Sinhalese-majority electorate but has since been mired in allegations of war crimes. Some 300,000 Tamils were herded into internment camps.

Rajapakse, 64, has ruled Sri Lanka since 2005. His three brothers and other family members are in key government positions including the ministries of defence and ports.

- AFP