(Agencies)
Updated: 2007-12-29 21:40

NAIROBI, Kenya - Kenya's opposition declared victory Saturday in the country's closest-ever presidential election on the basis of partial results, while tensions over the vote erupted into violence in Nairobi and opposition strongholds.

Authorities, meanwhile, appealed for patience as the vote count continued.

By Saturday afternoon, the Electoral Commission said millionaire opposition candidate Raila Odinga was leading with 3.7 million votes to President Mwai Kibaki's 3.4 million, with 159 of the 210 constituencies counted.

"We are confident that (Odinga) has won the election," campaign manager Mohamed Isahakia said.

Kibaki's campaign urged Kenyans to wait for official results from Thursday's race.

The election marks the first time an incumbent has faced a credible challenge in Kenya's four decades of independence from Britain. The race focused on corruption, with both candidates vowing to end the graft and tribal favoritism that has tainted Kenyan politics for years.

But the delays in results ignited tensions in the capital and opposition strongholds, with thousands of people waving machetes and looting shops and homes.

In Nairobi's Kibera slum, Odinga's main constituency, young men with fingers still stained with voting ink shouted "No Raila, No Kenya!" — an ominous call to declare him the winner. Hundreds of people swarmed out of the slum, heading for town, but police used tear gas to chase them back.

Smoke was billowing out of Kibera as homes, trees and stalls caught fire.

Hamisi Noor, 22, standing in front of his burnt-out home in Kibera, said a crowd threatened him with machetes before setting his home on fire and cutting his father across the face.

Noor, a member of Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe, said his assailants belonged to Odinga's Luo tribe. "I don't know who they were," said Noor, his trousers covered in blood and mud. "But they were Luos."

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