Left-Leaning Candidates Continue to Sweep Latin America

Paraguay could be only country from the Rio Grande to Patagonia 'where a firmly right-wing leader remains in power'

Celebrations broke out among left wing supporters across two Central American countries this weekend as elections in Costa Rica and El Salvador showed right wing candidates are increasingly loosing ground, Agence France-Presse reports.

"Left-leaning candidates dominated presidential elections in Central America on Sunday, with polls showing El Salvador's Salvador Sanchez Ceren and Costa Rica's Luis Guillermo Solis poised to claim victory in their respective runoffs," according to AFP. Those elections will take place in the coming weeks.

Ceren, former guerrilla leader of the Farabundo Marti Front for National Liberation (FMLN), won 48.9% of votes in the first round of a run-off election.

In what was considered a more surprising result, Solis, a former history professor, also finished with a strong lead in the first round of voting in Costa Rica.

As AFP reports:

Ceren and Solis are just the latest candidates to ride a wave of centre-left sympathy in Latin America, where right-wing parties are struggling to attract voters. [...]

If the former academic wins Costa Rica's runoff on April 6, Paraguay will be the only country between the Rio Grande to Patagonia where a firmly right-wing leader remains in power.

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