Ex-football star wins election with 61 percent of vote in West African country’s first democratic transition since 1944.

George Weah is set to win Liberia’s presidential election runoff, based on provisional results.

Weah, a former football star and senator from the Congress for Democratic Change party, has won more than 61 percent of the vote with 98 percent of ballots counted, according to Liberia’s election commission.

Weah has defeated Vice President Joseph Boakai of the ruling Unity Party, judging by the provisional results.

Outgoing president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who is at the end of her second six-year term, will transfer power to Weah in the nation’s first democratic transition since 1944.

The Liberian people clearly made their choice yesterday and all together we are very confident in the result of the electoral process. #Liberia #Liberia2017 — George Weah (@GeorgeWeahOff) December 27, 2017

Sirleaf’s tenure as Liberia’s president ended decades of conflict and civil war in the African nation.

The presidential vote began on December 27 after several legal challenges from the Unity Party that were dismissed by Liberia’s Supreme Court.

Liberia is one of the world’s poorest countries. Both Weah and Boakai ran on platforms that promised economic growth.