Cambodia's ruling party wins 46 seats, opposition 11 in Senate race: official results

PHNOM PENH, Feb. 18 (Xinhua) -- The Cambodian People's Party ( CPP) of Prime Minister Hun Sen gained 46 seats and Sam Rainsy Party (SRP), the country's main opposition party, won the remaining 11 seats in the election for the third legislature of the Senate late last month, according to the official results released by the National Election Committee (NEC) on Saturday.
Tep Nytha, NEC's secretary general, said that among the 57 elected senators, 8 are women--six belong to the CPP and two are in the SRP.
The Jan. 29's election had only the two parties in contest, and the voters were only 119 Members of Parliament and 11,351 commune councilors.
The Senate has 61 seats, but the election was held for only 57 seats as two senators will be nominated by the King and the other two by the National Assembly.
According to the constitution, the Senate will hold its first session no later than 60 days after the election.
Before taking office, the Senate will decide on the validity of each member's mandate and vote separately to choose a president, vice presidents and its members of each commission by a two-third majority vote, it said.
Cambodia's Senate election is held once in six years. The last one was in January 2006, at that time, three parties -- Cambodian People's Party, royalist Funcinpec and Sam Rainsy Party -- joined the race. As a result, the CPP won 45 seats, the royalist Funcinpec 10 seats and the Sam Rainsy Party two seats.