Australia elections 2022: Voting begins in tightly-contested election between Scott Morrison and Anthony Albanese

Australia elections 2022: Prime Minister Scott Morrison and Labor leader Anthony Albanese are contesting against each other to form the new government.

Canberra: Voting for Australia's federal election is underway on Saturday, where either the ruling Liberal-National Coalition or the opposition Labor party need to garner a majority in a close-run contest to form the new government. More than 8 million Australians are expected to cast their ballots at more than 7,000 polling booths across the country, according to the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC), and a record number of voters have already cast their ballots prior to the election day, reports Xinhua news agency.

Voting started at 8 a.m. on Saturday morning and will end at 6 p.m. when the counting votes will start.

(IANS photo)

In order to form a majority government, either the Coalition or the Labor must win at least 76 out of 151 seats in the lower house of Parliament -- the House of Representatives.