Polls open in Georgia presidential election

Georgians on Sunday started voting in a presidential poll to elect a successor to outgoing leader Mikheil Saakashvili with an ally of his billionaire foe Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili favourite to win, an AFP correspondent reported. Giorgi Margvelashvili -- representing Ivanishvili’s Georgian Dream coalition –- looked set to win the vote in the former Soviet state ahead of ex-parliament speaker David Bakradze from Saakashvili’s United National Movement party. The poll marks the end of US-ally Saakashvili’s legally permitted two terms in power and will usher in constitutional changes that shift a raft of powers from the next president to the prime minister.