April 16 (SeeNews) - Former Montenergrin prime minister and ex-president Milo Djukanovic has won an outright victory in the country's presidential elections, avoiding the need for a run-off vote, official data from the electoral commission showed on Monday.
With 98.90% of the votes counted, Djukanovic leads with 53.96% support in the first round of Montenegro's presidential elections, followed by Mladen Bojanic from the Positive Montenegro party with 33.38%, according to data released by the electoral commission.
Djukanovic has already claimed victory, with the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) he leads announcing that he will keep the Balkan state on course to EU membership.
Draginja Vuksanovic, MP of the Social Democratic Party and the first female presidential candidate in the history of Montenegro, has won 8.17% of the vote, while Marko Milacic, the founder and current president of extra-parliamentary populist political party True Montenegro, trails behind with 2.80%.
Hazbija Kalac, the leader of the Party for Justice and Peace, has won 0.81% of the vote, businessman and independent Vasilije Milickovic has 0.47%, and Dobrilo Dedeic, a representative of the Serbian coalition, has 0.41%.
"[...] we won 54% of votes and thus overpowered the joint efforts of the other six candidates. This is a confirmation of Montenegro's resolve to continue down the European path, to continue down the road that will lead us to EU membership," Djukanovic said in a statement issued by the Democratic Party of Socialists of Montenegro.
He also said his priority would be to guarantee employment and improve the standards of living.
Djukanovic is leader of DPS, which has been in power since the introduction of multi-party system in 1990. He served as prime minister of Montenegro from 1991 to 1998, as president of the country from 1998 to 2002, and as prime minister again from 2003 to 2006, from 2008 to 2010, and from 2012 to 2016.
The incumbent president of Montenegro, Filip Vujanovic, was reelected in the first round of the 2013 election on 51.2% of the vote. Vujanovic is ineligible in the April elections as under the Montenegrin Constitution a president can serve up to two terms in office.
According to the electoral commission, the voter turnout on Sunday was 63.91%.
Montenegro has a population of some 620,000.