Uruguay’s left-wing politician Yamandu Orsi received the presidential election, official outcomes confirmed Sunday, ending 5 years of conservative management.
The nation went to the polls for the second spherical of voting in what turned a good race between Orsi, of the Frente Amplio (Broad Front) alliance and Alvaro Delgado of the National Party, a member of outgoing President Luis Lacalle Pou’s center-right Republican Coalition.
Orsi promised in a victory speech Sunday night to be a president “who calls again and again for national dialogue to find the best solutions.”
Delgado in the meantime conceded defeat, saying he was sending “a big hug and a greeting to Yamandu Orsi.”
Though the election will shift the steadiness of energy in Uruguay, analysts didn’t foresee a large change within the nation’s financial route, with Orsi having beforehand promised “change that will not be radical.”
Both candidates pledged to struggle crime linked to drug trafficking and to spice up financial progress, which is recovering from the slowdown introduced by the COVID-19 pandemic and a historic drought.
Orsi received 1,196,798 votes in comparison with Delgado’s 1,101,296, the nation’s Electoral Court mentioned – 49.8% to 45.9%.
Cheers broke out within the capital Montevideo, a bastion of Frente Amplio assist, when projections exhibiting Orsi within the lead had been introduced.
His marketing campaign was boosted by assist from Jose “Pepe” Mujica, a former guerrilla lionized as “the world’s poorest president” due to his modest way of life throughout his 2010-2015 time in workplace.
Orsi, seen as an understudy of Mujica, had garnered 43.9% of the October 27 first-round vote – in need of the 50% wanted to keep away from a runoff however forward of the 26.7% of ballots solid for Delgado.
The pair got here out on prime of a crowded area of 11 candidates in search of to interchange Lacalle Pou, who has a excessive approval score however is barred constitutionally from in search of a second consecutive time period.
Following the October legislative elections, Orsi will govern with a majority within the Senate, although the Frente Amplio is within the minority within the Chamber of Representatives.
‘Very totally different world’
Orsi’s victory will see Uruguay swing left once more after 5 years of center-right rule within the nation of three.4 million inhabitants.
In 2005, the Frente Amplio coalition broke a decadeslong conservative stranglehold with an election victory and held the presidency for 3 straight phrases.
It was voted out in 2020 on the again of considerations about rising crime blamed on excessive taxes and a surge in cocaine trafficking by way of the port of Montevideo.
Polling numbers forward of the vote confirmed that perceived insecurity stays Uruguayans’ prime concern 5 years later.
A 72-year-old retiree who voted, Juan Antonio Stivan, mentioned he simply needed the following authorities to ensure “safety – to be able to go out in the street with peace of mind, as an old person, as a young person, as a child.”
Congratulations rolled in from throughout Latin America, together with from Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Mexico’s Claudia Sheinbaum and Chile’s Gabriel Boric.
“This is a victory for all of Latin America and the Caribbean,” Lula mentioned on X.
Outgoing chief Pou mentioned on social media that he referred to as Orsi “to place myself at his disposal to begin the transition as soon as I think it is appropriate.”
Voting is obligatory in Uruguay, one in all Latin America’s most secure democracies, with comparatively excessive per-capita revenue and low poverty ranges.
During the heyday of leftist rule, Uruguay legalized abortion and same-sex marriage, turned the primary Latin American nation to ban smoking in public locations and the world’s first nation, in 2013, to permit leisure hashish use.
Former President Mujica, who’s battling most cancers and had to make use of a cane to stroll into his polling station to vote, mentioned Sunday: “Personally, I’ve nothing extra to sit up for. My closest future is the cemetery, for causes of age.
“But I am interested in the fate of you, the young people who, when they are my age, will live in a very different world.”
Source: www.dailysabah.com