Fatmir Sejdiu said polling officials should announce who won the local elections held on Sunday with "more urgency."

The vote for city councils and mayors took place amid fears of fraud, tension between ethnic Albanian rivals and a massive boycott by minority Serbs who reject Kosovo's 2008 declaration of independence.

Preliminary results were due on Sunday night, but were postponed several times. A new deadline was set at 7 p.m. (1800 GMT; 1 p.m. EDT) Monday. The delay is blamed on the failure of a system that sends results by SMS text messages.

The president's comments come after Prime Minister Hashim Thaci claimed victory in 20 of the 36 municipalities. Opposition parties contested Thaci's outright victory.

Kosovo's election officials brushed aside any claims of fraud and said the new system _ part of a deal signed with Kosovo's state telecommunications company _ had not functioned.

"It simply didn't work out the way it was planned, so we had to do the count the old way," said Fehmi Ajvazi, spokesman for the Central Election Commission.

Some 45 percent of Kosovo's 1.5 million voters turned out to vote in the poll, which is seen as an important step for this new country trying to establish itself as an independent state.

European Union's top official in Kosovo, Pieter Feith said the poll was a success and praised minority Serbs for participating.

"I'm impressed with the willingness of the Serb community to participate in greater numbers than we had expected," Feith told the Associated Press.

Feith is also in charge of implementing a Western-backed plan that offered Serbs broad rights in exchange for Kosovo's independence.