Low turnout in Guinea poll

President Conte has been in power for 18 years

People in the Republic of Guinea are voting in parliamentary elections overshadowed by opposition calls for a boycott.

Early estimates suggest turnout has been low.

President Lansana Conte's critics say the election can be neither free nor fair.

Guinea poll

4.7 million electors

114 legislators

769 candidates

8,200 polling stations

Mr Conte has delayed it by two years, citing the fighting which was going on along the border with Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Guinea's best known opposition politician, Alpha Conde, recently gave a damning verdict on his country's democratic record.

Politics in Guinea, he said, were still in the Stone Age.

The BBC's Elizabeth Blunt says Guineans have enjoyed very little democratic freedom over the years.

Pluralism

Guinea's independence leader, Ahmed Sekou Toure, ran it as a one party dictatorship for 26 years, until his death in 1984.

Conde: Politics in Guinea are "still in Stone Age"

The army immediately seized power, and General Conte has ruled the country ever since - first as a military head of state and then as an elected president.

Faced with the prospect of having to stand down after two terms in office, he organised a referendum last year to change the constitution.

Now there is no legal limit to how many times he can be re-elected.

Guinea is no longer a one-party state, and a dozen parties will be putting up candidates for the assembly.

But several other parties will be boycotting the vote, including Alpha Conde's RPG. They say the results have been determined in advance and there is no doubt who will win.

Certainty

Mr Conde did take part in the last two presidential elections.

The first time the votes in two of his main strongholds were disallowed, the second time he was arrested the day after the voting and charged with treason.

The European Union has declined to help pay for the elections or to send observers.

Our correspondent says the ruling party and its allies seem certain to win a majority in the assembly.

Turnout has been low in the capital, Conakry, and its suburbs.

No incidents have been reported.