By ALEXANDRA VALENCIA Reuters
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QUITO — An April presidential run-off in Ecuador will pit incumbent Daniel Noboa against leftist Luisa Gonzalez, in an unexpectedly tight contest featuring the same two candidates who were in a 2023 snap election.

Most polls had predicted Noboa, the 37-year-old heir to a business fortune, would win, with some even predicting an outright victory in a single round. But he was less than a point ahead of Gonzalez on Sunday with the two headed for a run-off, which could give the role of kingmakers to the candidates in third and fourth place.

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With more than 92% of ballot boxes counted, Noboa had a share of 44.3% to Gonzalez’s 43.8%.

Noboa cheered what he said was a victory against “Old Ecuador” in a written statement on Monday morning, promising to “fight like it was the first day”. He did not speak to supporters on Sunday night.

Noboa has campaigned on a 15% cut in violent deaths, a reduction in prison violence and the capture of major gang leaders during 15 months in office, and vowed to keep deploying the military on the streets and in prisons to fight insecurity.

But leftist Gonzalez, 47, along with Noboa’s 14 other first-round rivals, called for more efforts to fight the drug trade-related crime that has rocked Ecuador in recent years.

Gonzalez, a protege of former President Rafael Correa, has said she would fight crime with major military and police operations, pursue corrupt judges and prosecutors and roll out a social spending plan in the most violent areas.

“We always planned on a second round,” Gonzalez said in a Monday morning interview with television channel Teleamazonas, adding she was seeking unity.

“The votes that we obtained in this first phase of the election shows that people want change, that they are not willing to support four more years of what we have lived this year and a half,” she said.

Ecuador’s government bonds plunged as they resumed trading on Monday, on the two months of uncertainty now facing the country before the run-off.

Indigenous leader Leonidas Iza, who led protests that nearly unseated Noboa’s predecessor, was tallying 5.26% of the votes, while Andrea Gonzalez, once the vice presidential candidate for an assassinated anti-corruption crusader, won 2.7%.

Iza, congratulated by Luisa Gonzalez in remarks on Sunday night, is seen as unlikely to back Noboa, whom he has accused of improvising his policies and of wanting to privatize state assets. But he has also heavily criticized Correa.

Iza said on Sunday night his movement would decide collectively who to support in the run-off.

Andrea Gonzalez, who is no relation to Luisa Gonzales, was running with Fernando Villavicencio in 2023 when he was shot while leaving a campaign rally.