Fijians are just hours away from finding out the results of the nation's election, with the race coming down to two former coup leaders.
Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama's FijiFirst government is currently ahead in the tally with 42 per cent of the vote.
Sitiveni Rabuka's People's Alliance is sitting on 36 per cent, while the National Federation Party has just under nine per cent and the Social Democratic Liberal Party five.
The other five political parties are sitting under the five per cent threshold needed to get a member elected to the expanded 55-member parliament.
Bainimarama - who came to power after instigating a coup in 2006 - currently commands a slim majority, which is now under threat.
Rabuka and opposition parties have been alleging problems with the voting system and say they've lost faith in the Fijian Elections Office.
But there's still a path to power for Rabuka - also a former coup leader turned prime minister - who has flagged a coalition with the National Federation Party.
The final decision on who to form government with could come down to Social Democratic Liberal Party leader Viliame Gavoka.
Gavoka ousted Rabuka as party leader, which led to the former prime minister establishing the People's Alliance and drawing nine additional members across.
The Multinational Observer Group says it has not observed "any significant irregularities or issues during pre-polling, postal voting or election day voting".
But Rabuka and leaders from three other opposition parties continue to allege voting irregularities.
Former prime minister and Labour Party leader Mahendra Chaudhry alleged possible fraud.
Chaudhry said he had people willing to sign statutory declarations saying they voted for him at a particular booth he recorded no ballots at when counted.
"I am personally confident hundreds of my votes have been hijacked or disappeared," he said.
"That's why I am alleging possible fraud."
Supervisor of Elections Mohammed Saneem rubbished the claim, saying he was still waiting for Chaudhry to produce evidence from when he alleged fraud in 2014 and 2018.
He said he'd received one complaint of that nature but the woman had been looking at the wrong polling station.
Saneem also disputed allegations he wasn't giving opposition parties enough access to raw data to verify results, saying party members had already requested and received it.
"The left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing," he said.
"You are calling the integrity of the election into question but you don't know that your party already has all this information."
Saneem is accusing the opposition parties of spouting conspiracy theories about the election without any evidence and says they are attempting to discredit the process before the final results have been tallied.
"I would like to urge everybody to have the patience for the results data entry to be completed," he said. .
"Once you have the results, then you go around doing whatever you want to do. We have no worries about that.
"If someone is not happy with the result, there is a legal process that follows."
This article was made possible through the Melbourne Press Club's Michael Gordon Journalism Fellowship Program.
