Tbilisi/Moscow  - Polls opened in Georgia on Wednesday in a parliamentary vote that will test President Mikheil Saakashvili's increasingly challenged political clout at home and democratic credentials in the eyes of the West.

Georgians cast their ballots mere months after Saakashvili, 40, won by 54 per cent in snap elections called in the wake of violence between police and opposition protestors blaming the government for corruption, unemployment and curbing freedoms.

More than 4,500 observers were monitoring the elections Wednesday when polls opened at 8 am (0400 GMT). The first official results are expected one day after polls close at 8 pm (1600 GMT), the election commission said.

Saakashvili's opponents charge his re-election was fraud riven and threaten to take to the street if they see cause in what is Georgia's second-ever attempt at an open parliamentary contest since the post- Soviet state's pro-democracy Rose Revolution five years ago.

The US-educated Saakashvili provoked rare Western criticism against his imposition of emergency rule and repression of anti- government protesters, but concern sharpened in recent weeks over Russia's support for Georgia's two separatist regions.

Saakasvili has lobbied for the West to insure Georgia's territorial integrity angering Moscow, which pointed to the conflict zones as a crucial argument against Saakashvili's US supported push for his country's entry into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

Saakashvili has said that the situation neared open conflict two weeks ago, and Russia has increased its peacekeeping troops in the autonomous regions to the maximum under a 1994 ceasefire that ended a civil war.

The mountainous former Soviet republic has been at the heart of regional struggle for influence between the United States and neighbouring Russia since it gained its independence in 1991. Stretching south east from the Black Sea, Georgia straddles a key pipeline for Caspian gas to Europe.

Saakashvili has overseen a soaring GDP of 12 per cent last year and is credited with economic reforms.

The 3.4 million registered voters are expected to mostly support Saakashvili's party the National Movement Democrats (NMD), but if the voters decide to punish the NMD even a little it could lose its current two-thirds majority in the legislature and ability to change the constitution.

Saakashvili in April lost a key ally when Prime Minister Nino Burjanadze, a woman widely seen in Georgia as a calming force declared she would neither run for parliament nor serve any longer in the NMD.

Nationwide surveys are predicting a solid win for Saakashvili's party, taking some 57 per cent of the popular vote, with the United Opposition Council gaining 16 per cent, the Christian Democrats 9 per cent, the Labour Party 7 per cent, and the Republican Party below the representation threshold at 4 per cent, according a Greenburg Quinlan survey.

Analysts fear that Georgia's opposition could well act out its threats of post-election demonstrations against rigged voting leading to pro-longed unrest. (dpa)