CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) December 5, 2005 —  Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s political party, MVR, said Sunday it won 114 National Assembly seats out of 167 in congressional elections to give it more than two-thirds of the legislature.

Earlier, the National Electoral Council said turnout was about 25 percent of registered voters.
The council had yet to give an official voting tally.

Main opposition parties boycotted the poll after accusing electoral authorities of favoring the Chavez and manipulating electronic voting machines. The boycott is likely to raise questions over the legitimacy of a parliament under the full control of lawmakers loyal to the populist leader.

Chavez, a former soldier fiercely opposed to the U.S. administration, has denounced the boycott as a Washington-backed plot to overthrow him, a charge the U.S. government brushed off as propaganda.

Authorities played down the boycott's impact and said it was limited to a small share of candidates who pulled out because they had no support.

Yet critics say low voter turnout and pro-Chavez control over Congress could undermine the new legislature's legitimacy.

Government officials, from ministers to army commanders, led an aggressive campaign to get Venezuelans to vote and dismiss the opposition walkout as a failed effort to scuttle the election.

"They have committed their last error with this abstention, it's their political funeral," Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel said on Saturday. "In no way will they affect the legitimacy of this government."

Chavez could gain more power

Lawmakers backing the left-wing leader have said they want to use a new majority to press constitutional reforms such as lifting limits on presidential re-elections, which critics fear will hand Chavez more power.

Opposition parties, struggling to unite and compete with Chavez, backed out of the vote this week after accusing the country's National Electoral Council of favoring him and tampering with an automatic-ballot system.

"Elections without any opposition and with low turnout aren't good for anyone, not least the government, which should evaluate the anti-democratic impact," wrote TalCual newspaper editor Teodoro Petkoff.

Caracas was calm before the election as Venezuelans enjoyed Christmas shopping and holiday celebrations.

U.S. officials, who portray Chavez as a threat to democracy, have rejected his anti-U.S. rhetoric as an attempt to stir nationalist sentiment and mobilize his power base in the world's No. 5 oil-exporting country.

Since his 1998 election, Chavez has locked horns constantly with Washington over his socialist revolution and close ties to communist Cuba.

He has spent billions of dollars in oil revenues on social projects for the poor.

In what analysts said was a public relations coup, Chavez's government this year began selling subsidized heating fuel to poor U.S. communities even as relations between Caracas and Washington frayed further.

Since Chavez won a referendum last year, his opponents have struggled to overcome divisions and distrust of the electoral council, which they charge manipulated voting machines to give Chavez a victory.

Observers from the Organization of American States monitoring Sunday's vote had said they found no evidence of ballot tampering in the referendum.

Since then, the electoral council has yielded to several opposition demands, including allowing an audit on 47 percent of the ballots.