Polls have closed in Myanmar in the country's first free national election in a quarter of a century.

The party of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi is expected to secure the largest share of votes cast by the 30 million-strong electorate.

But a hangover from the military junta, which ceded power four years ago, means she cannot become president even if her National League for Democracy (NLD) wins a landslide.

And despite the shift to democracy from dictatorship, concerns remain over the election after it was revealed around four million people would be barred from voting.

There has also been criticism over the continuing persecution of the country's Rohinya Muslims.

However the historic ballot has generated excitement among voters.

Former teacher Daw Myint, 55, casting her vote for NLD at a polling station in Yangon, said: "I've done my bit for change, for the emergence of democracy.

"I do hope everything goes well in this historic event."

The results of the election are expected to come in slowly with a clear picture not due to emerge until Monday evening at the earliest.

Ms Suu Kyi, a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, convincingly won the country's last free vote in 1990 but the military regime refused to hand over control.

She was to spend most of the next 20 years under house arrest before her release in 2010.

The 70-year-old is barred from becoming president under the constitution written by the junta, which bars anyone with a foreign spouse or child from holding the top job.

Ms Suu Kyi's late husband and sons are British.

However, she has said she will play a leading role if she wins a majority and is able to form Myanmar's first democratically elected government since the 1960s.

In the run up to the election, security has been tightened with 40,000 specially trained police deployed to polling stations.

(Sky News)