KEY POINTS:
Rwanda is on course to become the first country in the world where women MPs outnumber men.
The small central African country, known for one of the worst genocides of modern times, is now comparatively stable and this week's elections passed off peacefully.
The head of the electoral
commission, Chrysologue Karangwa, said: "We have not yet got full results, [but] it's clear women representatives will be more than 50 per cent."
Women took at least 44 out of a total of 80 seats, according to early results yesterday after voting ended on Wednesday.
"The problems of women are understood ... much better by women themselves," Anne Kayitesi, a voter, told the BBC's Focus on Africa.
"Men, especially in our culture, used to think that women [were] there to be in the house, cook food, look after the children ... but the real problems of a family are known by a woman and when they do it, they help a country to get much better."
The results of the poll - only the second to be held in the country since the deaths in 1994 of 800,000 people in 100 days - also represented a strong endorsement of the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), the party set up by President Paul Kagame.
Rwanda descended into chaos 14 years ago as ethnic tensions spilled over into a systematic massacre of the minority Tutsis and their Hutu sympathisers by the Hutu majority.
Kagame, a former rebel whose forces ended the slaughter, is credited by supporters with restoring order and fostering economic growth, especially in new technologies.
And the World Bank has praised the coffee-growing country for reforms it credits for the current boom. Rwanda was the fastest-reforming economy in a region that is increasingly of interest to emerging-markets investors, it said.
Last month former United States President Bill Clinton - who cites his inaction during the genocide as the main regret from his time in office - agreed to help promote Rwandan coffee.
Since the genocide, Rwanda's Government has encouraged women and minorities into politics, using a quota system that has awarded 24 seats to women-only candidates and a further three seats to youth and disabled representatives.
Some Rwandans say their numbers in Parliament reflect disenchantment with the country's male, genocide-era politicians. Quota MPs cannot represent a political party.
Despite Opposition criticism of his authoritarian tendencies and a long-standing tussle over responsibility for the genocide with France, the former colonial power, Mr Kagame is popular.
The opposition quickly conceded defeat after it became clear that the RPF had won a landslide. The Socio-Democratic Party was runner-up in the election with seven seats, and the Liberal Party with four, according to provisional results. A further 27 seats will be assigned this week.
The mountainous country has 4.7 million registered voters out of a population of more than 9 million.
- INDEPENDENT
