Canberra - Australians go to the polls on Saturday for an election that is likely to see a new conservative government elected. With opinion polls suggesting that Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's labor party will lose and the centre-right opposition will take power.
If the opposition party wins the vote, their leader Tony Abbott would become Australia's next prime minster.
Abbott's opposition to a government "carbon tax" and an ever-tougher stance towards asylum seekers had put him ahead in opinion polls.
Rival Labor party seems to have lost many voters to Abbot's Liberal-National party due to squabbling within the team.
Kevin Rudd ousted Prime Minister Julia Gillard from the ruling party in June. The move reinvigorated the campaign, but as Labour infighting continued more voters swung to Abbot's coalition.
The 55-year-old conservative Abbott has never been very popular nationally but his Liberal Party colleagues elected him their leader by just a single vote in 2009.
