Afghan presidential candidate Dr. Abdullah Abdullah was leading in the partial results announced by the country's election body on Sunday, the Independent Election Commission (IEC) chairman said.

"The IEC had tallied the 10 percent of the votes from 26 provinces and the partial results were announced Sunday," the IEC Chairman Ahmad Yousuf Nouristani told reporters in Kabul.

"Dr. Abdullah Abdullah secured 41.9 percent of partial results followed by Dr. Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai who received 37.6 and Dr. Zulmai Rassoul 9.9 percent of the results," Nouristani said, adding results may change in future as the IEC is in the process of counting the votes.

On April 5, more than 7 million Afghans, out of 12 million eligible voters, cast their vote to elect a successor for the outgoing President Hamid Karzai for the next five years in the first transfer of power through polling in the country's history.

Up to 36 percent of the voters were women.

The number of presidential candidates has dropped to eight after the withdrawal of three contenders from the race, and over 2, 500 candidates run for 458 provincial councils' seats in 34 provinces, including 96 seats for women.

Presidential election complaint period is from April 7 to April 27. Under the Afghan law official result cannot be announced until serious complaints are adjudicated.

The preliminary results will come out on April 24 and the final result will be announced in mid May.

If no candidate garner 50 percent plus one vote, a run-off between the top two candidates will be held on May 28.