JAKARTA (AFP) - Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyonos party won most seats Thursday in elections seen as a key test for the countrys youthful democracy, according to a leading polling institute. Projections by the independent Indonesian Survey Institute have the centrist Democrats winning 20.4 percent of the votes, based on a near-complete unofficial count of ballots from 2,100 polling stations. The opposition Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) of ex-president Megawati Sukarnoputri gained 14.6 percent and Suhartos former ruling party, Golkar, was close behind with 14 percent. At this stage the data is stable. The Democrats are the winning party with the most number of votes, institute director Saiful Mujani told Metro TV television station. Islamic parties were projected to win a total of just 25.7 percent, their worst showing in the countrys history as people focused on practical concerns like growth and jobs amid the global economic crisis. It was the third general election since the fall of the Suharto dictatorship in 1998 ushered in a new era of reform, turning Indonesia into the worlds third-largest democracy, after India and the United States. Final official results from across the archipelagos 6,000 inhabited islands could take weeks to tally, and the shape of the new government will not be known until after presidential elections in July. The outcome of the vote will be crucial for parties hoping to field a candidate in the more important presidential polls, when liberal ex-general Yudhoyono will seek a second five-year term. Parties must hold 20 percent of seats in the 560-seat lower house or 25 percent of the popular vote to nominate a presidential candidate on their own, otherwise they must team up with coalition partners. We will start tomorrow engaging in political communications (with other parties), Yudhoyono told reporters after the close of polls. Carefully avoiding any claim to victory, he added: We will see what kind of coalition we have and how many presidential candidates meet the requirements. The Democrats dramatic rise from one of the smallest parties in the outgoing parliament to the largest means it will be able to take its pick of coalition partners, possibly a small, moderate Islamic party. Founded in 2001, it was a junior partner in a coalition with Golkar in the outgoing government, holding just 57 seats in the lower house compared to 128 for the older, nationalist Golkar. Yudhoyono had an uneasy relationship with his vice-president, Golkar chairman Jusuf Kalla, who has hinted he will run against the popular incumbent in the looming presidential race. The election was peaceful except for a series of attacks overnight Wednesday by suspected separatist rebels in eastern Papua province, where some members of the indigenous Melanesian majority want to split from Indonesia. Five people were killed in the attacks which including a raid by suspected separatist guerrillas armed with arrows and bombs on a police post near the capital Jayapura. No unrest was reported in Aceh province, where a 30-year separatist conflict ended only four years ago and fears of violence were high after several ex-rebels were murdered in the lead-up to the election. Analysts said that while many of the old guard from the Suharto days remained entrenched in the countrys political elite, the election was further proof that Indonesias democratic reforms were on track. It was only a decade ago, with the Suharto regime in ruins and the economy ravaged by the Asian financial crisis, that Indonesia was seen as teetering on the brink of disintegration. Now it is being viewed as an example of stability in Southeast Asia, where democracy is on the back foot in countries like Thailand, Malaysia and the Philippines, analysts said. For me this is a big day that we have managed to come this far with our new democracy, which in fact is not just surviving but stabilising, political analyst Wimar Witoelar told AFP.