Early Congo results go president146;s way

Turnout was about 84 percent in Goma, Shemaesi said. Kabila also won heavy support in another eastern town, Beni, she said.

Official, countrywide results may not be announced for weeks. Individual polling stations have been posting their results, but Tuesday8217;s reports from Goma and Beni were the first to compile results from across localities.

Kabila is considered to have strong support in the war-battered east where he was born, but less in the western capital, Kinshasa, where Bemba appears popular.

If none of the 33 candidates win a majority during the initial round of voting in Congo8217;s first multiparty elections for a head of state since 1961, a second round is scheduled for late October between the two top vote-winners. Voters also cast ballots on July 30 for a 500-seat national assembly.

A preliminary countrywide tally was expected to be announced on August 20, and the final tally on August 31. Officials had at first said no partial results would be released, but have backtracked because of the uncertainty fanned by competing camps making claims based on their own compilations.

The government chosen in the elections will replace a national-unity government arranged in 2002 under peace accords that ended back-to-back wars that began in 1996.