Voters in military-run Guinea-Bissau cast their ballots on Sunday in a referendum that could give the president more powers ahead of a general election meant to restore civilian rule later this year.

Voting got off to a slow start in some neighbourhoods when polls opened at 0700 GMT, AFP correspondents said, after a heavy early morning downpour.

Security was stepped up at strategic points in the capital, with members of the national guard and the police stationed at key locations.

Voting closes at 1700 GMT, with the first provisional results due from Tuesday.

The referendum comes less than 10 months after a coup in which the military seized power in the impoverished Portuguese-speaking west African country.

Shopkeeper Halimatou Traore told AFP she hoped the new constitution would bring positive changes.

“The successive crises the country has gone through have had a very negative impact on my earnings. If everything goes well, Guinea-Bissau will set off on new paths,” she said as she waited to vote.

Braima Seidy, 76, a veteran of the war of independence against Portugal, emerged smiling from the polling booth.

“I truly believe that this new Constitution can bring stability to the country,” he told AFP.

The junta says the change seeks to stabilise institutions before new presidential and parliamentary elections designed to hand power back to civilians scheduled for December 6.

But the political climate is tense in the coup-prone coastal nation, where the opposition has urged voters to boycott the referendum “in a context of restrictions on public freedoms”.