ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia – Ethiopians voted by the millions yesterday, responding enthusiastically to an open parliamentary race without parallel in the country’s history. The coalition that ended a brutal dictatorship faced an opposition promising greater liberalization.

The worst problem foreign election observers found was the crowds, with some voters waiting hours to cast their ballots. But a senior opposition official said after the vote that his party’s observers had been chased out of polling centers where ballots were being tallied.

“In many places our poll watchers are being kicked out and we don’t know who is counting the vote,” the vice chairman of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy, Berhanu Nega, said.

His party had not yet decided whether to accept the results. “This is too important to rush into a decision,” he said. “We need to get all data.”

Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, known as one of the continent’s more progressive leaders, pledged that his sometimes-authoritarian government would introduce greater democracy.