Colombian President Alvaro Uribe has secured a majority in the country's Congress and immediately used his renewed political strength to urge leftist guerrillas to revive the stalled peace process.
Sunday's legislative vote was a major setback for the opposition Liberal Party which has ceased to control the largest congressional faction for the first time in 50 years.
"I ask the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia [FARC] to revise its behavior, review the democratic calling of all Colombians and consider the possibility of serious and urgent peace talks," Uribe said.
FARC, with 18,000 fighters, is the largest and best-equipped insurgent force in Colombia. The rebels have stepped up their attacks to defend their influence in rural areas in advance of the elections.
But the rebels appear to have failed to disrupt the vote.
With almost 85 percent of all votes counted, a seven-party ruling coalition was poised to control at least 61 out of 102 Senate seats. Two senate seats are reserved for indigenous people.
The results are better for Uribe than pollsters had predicted. The Party of the U and the Conservative Party led the pack in the Senate race while the Liberals were fighting for third place with another pro-Uribe party, Radical Change.
Polling was held under tight security on Sunday. Uribe, casting his ballot in downtown Bogota, urged voters not to be intimidated by the attacks.
"Voting is the best reply that we Colombians have to the violence," he said.
Some 26.5 million qualified voters selected 102 members to the Senate out of 823 candidates and 165 members to the House of Representatives out of 1,968 hopefuls.
The elections were overseen by some 50 international monitors from 15 countries.
In the only major incident of the day, a few minutes after the polls opened, two buses and a taxi were set ablaze by masked assailants in Bogota. Authorities reported no victims in Sunday's elections in 1,100 municipalities.
"The vote was not postponed anywhere in Colombia and 200,000 forces made sure it was calm," said Interior Minister Sabas Pretelt.
Opposition parties held primary elections to choose presidential candidates for the May 28 polls. Liberal politician Horacio Serpa and left-wing lawyer Carlos Gaviria, who represents the Democratic Alternative Party, were elected opposition candidates, who will challenge Uribe in presidential elections scheduled for May.
Uribe has become so popular that Colombia amended its Constitution to allow him to run again in May for a second four-year term.
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