Ex-Minister Juan Manuel Santos leads Colombia vote

[Forkboy]

Former Colombian Defence Minister Juan Manuel Santos has won the first round of the country's presidential election.

With almost all the ballots counted, Mr Santos - who is supported by popular incumbent Alvaro Uribe - is credited with about 47% of the vote.

His main rival, Antanas Mockus of the Green Party, achieved 21%.

Although Mr Santos failed to win outright, he is expected to get the support of some defeated candidates and to win the 20 June run-off.

Mr Santos, of the Social National Unity Party, has promised to continue the tough security policies of Mr Uribe - who cannot run after having served two consecutive terms.

Mr Mockus, a former mayor of Bogota, has put more emphasis on education and fighting corruption.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/latin_america/10195622.stm

[Colobo]

1. Uribe has a very high approval rating among Colombians

65% if I'm not mistaken, so it's not a surprise that the man he's backing and that promises to govern similarly is winning.

[Imajika]

2. Yup, you are right...

It is a bit of a surprise about the margins of victory though. Some opinion polls were showing the Green/Environmentalist candidate challenging him. The opinion polls and the election results are massively different. Same thing just happened in the Czech Republic. Right wing party's just won when opinion polls suggested the Social Democrats should have done well.

[provis99]

3. Columbia is not a democracy.

So its no surprise that opinion polls don't reflect election results. Politics is competely corrupt in Columbia, and the government is run by a right-wing conspiracy of big landowners, businessmen, and military strongmen.

http://politifi.com/news/Electoral-fraud-remains-unpunished-723751.html

http://www.opendemocracy.net/jose-manuel-barreto/colombia%E2%80%99s-elections-corruption-or-legality