Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's party said Monday that it has won 56 of the 57 parliamentary seats from Myanmar's main city of Yangon, a result that portends a massive sweep in historic elections that could eventually give it the presidency next year.
The National League for Democracy announced that it had won 44 of the 45 lower house seats and all 12 of the upper house seats from Yangon, a party stronghold, AP reported. As the results were announced, huge cheers broke out among the crowd of red-shirted supporters outside the party headquarters. The Yangon result was not announced by the government's Union Election Commission, but the NLD has stationed representatives at counting centers and is keeping reliable tallies that are being relayed to the headquarters. The election commission has been slow in releasing the numbers.
Earlier, Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate and pro-democracy icon, urged supporters not to provoke losing rivals who mostly represent the former junta that ruled this Southeast Asian nation for a half-century.
Hours before the Yangon announcement, party spokesman Win Htein said the NLD had won about 70 percent of the votes counted by midday. Another spokesman, Nyan Win, put the number at 90 percent.
