The Harvard-trained mayor of Quito who promised to end rampant corruption and political chaos was the apparent winner in Ecuador's presidential election Sunday, an exit poll showed.
Jamil Mahuad, of the centrist Christian Democrat party, topped populist banana tycoon Alvaro Naboa, who had the backing of ousted President Abdala Bucaram, according to the poll sponsored by seven television stations.Mahuad had about 53 percent to just over 46 percent for Naboa, Ecuador's richest man, the poll estimated. In past elections, this exit poll has been accurate.
If the exit poll again proves accurate, Mahuad will replace interim President Fabian Alarcon, ending 17 months of transition government that began when Congress removed the eccentric Bucaram from power for "mental incapacity" amid street protests.
Election organizers feared many voters in this small Andean nation of 12 million would stay home to watch Brazil play France in the World Cup final rather than go to the polls to elect a new leader.
Some voters seemed inclined to do both and carried out their civic duty dressed in yellow and green, the colors of their preferred team, Brazil.
Mahuad, 48, and Noboa, 47, were the top vote-getters in the first round of voting on May 31, but neither got enough votes to win the election outright.
Mahuad entered election day with a hefty lead in the polls, buoyed by a reputation as an honest, effective politician he earned during his six years as mayor of Quito, Ecuador's capital.
But Mahuad's once-massive lead in the polls shrank sharply in the final days of the campaign as Noboa announced populist measures, promising to create one million jobs.
Noboa, who calls himself the candidate of the poor despite his wealth, voted Sunday with a Bible in hand.
"The country's destiny is in the hands of God," he said.
Preliminary results were expected several hours after polls close later Sunday. Official results are expected Wednesday, according to the elections board.
The new president will inherit Ecuador's tattered democratic reputation and an economy staggered by El Nino-driven floods, deepening poverty and plummeting prices of the nation's main export, oil.
Ecuador's political carnival hit a low point in February 1997, when Congress removed the eccentric Bucaram, nicknamed "El Loco" - the Crazy One - from office for "mental incapacity."