Showing their voting cards, Sierra Leoneans crowd polling stations to vote on Saturday.<br/> <br />They say they want to elect leaders who will bring prosperity to the poor, conflict-scarred West African state, still recovering from a bitter 11-year civil war.<br/> <br />The presidential and parliamentary polls are the third since that conflict ended in 2002.<br/> <br />The vote pits President Ernest Bai Koroma and his ruling All People's Congress against challenger Julius Maada Bio, a former junta leader who represents the Sierra Leone People's Party.<br/> <br />(SOUNDBITE)(English) FREETOWN RESIDENT, NYUNUKU JABBIE, SAYING:<br/> <br />"I feel very happy because we need a change in government. Because we've been getting more suppression - too much - from this current government, so I need change."<br/> <br />The vote is expected to be close.<br/> <br />To win outright, a candidate must gain 55 percent of the vote and the race may well go to a second round.<br/> <br />With rivalry running high, there are concerns a close result could ignite violence.<br/> <br />But a strong consensus also exists among voters that Sierra Leone must never be allowed to fall back into the violence of its brutal civil war.
