Sunday morning, Hun Sen and his wife cast their votes at the polling station in the provincial Teacher Training Center near his residence in Takhmao town of Kandal province.
"So far, the atmosphere is good and I hope that today, until the end of the voting and the counting of ballots, the election will go smoothly across the country," the 57-year-old premier told reporters.
He didn't comment anything further inside the polling station, because it was against the election law.
Nget Sovandary, a 39-year-old school teacher, said that she voted for a leader that could make her living standard better.
"The election is very important for me because it provides me with citizen rights to choose a leader that we love," she said.
Chea Savuth, a 43-year-old civil servant, said that he was so happy with voting because "we will choose a leader that will bring the country with peace and economic development."
Official records showed that Cambodian had 11 percent of economic growth on average in the past three years, the highest among Southeast Asian countries. The per capita GDP rose from 448 U.S. dollars in 2005 to 594 U.S. dollars in 2007 and the foreign reserves from 890 million U.S. dollars in 2005 to 1.1 billion U.S. dollars in 2007.
While campaigning during the past month, Hun Sen and his CPP repeatedly cited these positive economic figures and development of infrastructure as the major achievements of his government in order to boost the electoral results.
NEC held a press conference Sunday afternoon, saying that the polling was conducted nationwide smoothly and successfully, as scheduled from 7:00 a.m. local time (0000 GMT) to 3:00 p.m. (0800 GMT).
Some voters went to the polling stations only to find that they were not registered by NEC, which has been the major problem so far in the polling day, said NEC, while not telling their number.
In addition, it rained in Kaoh Kong province and Sihanoukville municipality Sunday, but the weather didn't affect the people who cast their ballots there, NEC officials added.
