AP

In this photo provided by Comedy Central, Stephen Colbert, center, and Jon Stewart, right, hold hands during The Colbert Report, as Trevor Potter looks on Thursday, Jan. 12, 2012, in New York. During the episode, Colbert legally transferred his super political action committee to Stewart, his friend and Comedy Central cohort. Dropping by from "The Daily Show," Stewart happily signed the documents and accepted the post, which was ceremonially observed by the two holding hands and bodily transferring the PAC powers. (AP Photo/Comedy Central, Kristopher Long)

US comedian Stephen Colbert, whose alter-ego as a blowhard right-wing TV host has made him one of the country's top satirists, is entering the presidential race.

Colbert, 47, announced on his show late Thursday that he was forming an exploratory committee to enter the South Carolina

Republican primary after polls there showed he was ahead of some of the bona-fide candidates such as former Utah Governor John Huntsman.

“For over a day now, the people of South Carolina have been crying out for someone to restore our nation's former greatness to its current perfection,” Colbert said.

“Well, America, that someone is now. I am proud to announce that I am forming an exploratory committee to lay the groundwork for my possible candidacy for the President of the United States of South Carolina.”

The move was another step in Colbert's skewering of the electoral system and its loose financial controls, which allow organizations called Political Action Committees to spend unlimited amounts of cash as long as they are not officially coordinated with any candidate.

“With your help, and possibly the help of some outside group that I am not coordinating with,” Colbert said as confetti and balloons rained down on the studio, “we can explore taking this country back. Thank you, God bless you all.”

Previously, Colbert had formed such a so-called Super PAC which can raise unlimited funds from organization, individuals and companies, without having to reveal the sources of its income.

On Thursday he transferred control of the body to Comedy Central colleague Jon Stewart.

“The Colbert Super PAC is dead,” Stewart said. “But it has been reborn as “The Definitely Not Coordinating With Stephen Colbert Super PAC.”

Colbert pointed out that such close ties were legal under the US electoral system as other Republican candidates such as Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry all have Super PACs run by close associates. - Sapa-dpa