Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega, a former Marxist leader, is heading for a landslide victory in yesterday's presidential election.
Mr Ortega had 63 per cent support based on a sample of votes from almost 40 per cent of polling stations in yesterday's presidential election.
Votes were being counted slowly so Mr Ortega's victory was not yet formally announced but is well ahead of his two main conservative rivals, popular radio personality Fabio Gadea and former president Arnoldo Aleman.
Mr Ortega (65) had needed only 40 per cent support to take a first round victory and avoid a run-off vote.
If the early results hold, the huge victory margin will be a personal triumph for a man who was for long a divisive figure - popular among his Sandinista party's supporters but despised by business leaders and distrusted by many Nicaraguans.
Mr Ortega has moderated some of his socialist policies since taking office in early 2007 and won praise for letting private businesses work untroubled even as he pushed anti-poverty policies.
Helped by financial support from Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, Mr Ortega put money into health and education programs, provided loans for small businesses and gave aid to farmers.
Mr Chavez and Cuban president Raul Castro both congratulated Mr Ortega on his victory, although he himself had yet to speak publicly.
Critics accuse Mr Ortega of using the Sandinistas' control of the Supreme Court to lift a ban on consecutive presidential terms in a controversial 2009 decision, and of planning to further extend his rule, just as Mr Chavez has done in Venezuela.
A win would give Mr Ortega his first back-to-back terms in office since he helped the Sandinista rebel army to overthrow the Somoza family's dictatorship in a 1979 revolution.
Yet his lead was bigger than the win projected by opinion polls and Gadea supporters accused Mr Ortega's Sandinista party of manipulating the electoral process, stuffing ballot boxes and making it hard for conservatives to cast their vote.
There were also outbreaks of violence during voting, with nine people injured in a clash in northern Nicaragua.The mood was festive on the streets of Managua, however, where hundreds went out to celebrate an Ortega victory.
Mr Ortega has overseen a period of economic progress in his five years in power, backed by funds from his socialist ally in Venezuela, President Hugo Chavez.
Having survived a US-backed Contra rebellion as president in the later half of the 1980s, Mr Ortega was voted out in 1990. Since his return, he has solidified his hold on Central America's poorest country with programmes to improve health and education, microcredits and gifts of livestock.
Backed by Venezuela, Mr Ortega has reduced poverty in this largely agrarian nation and is credited with allowing the private sector to operate freely.
His task has been made easier because his two main conservative opponents failed to join forces against him.
But he was only able to run for re-election thanks to a 2009 ruling by the Supreme Court - which his Sandinista party controls - that did away with a ban on consecutive terms.
The court's decision has led to accusations that Mr Ortega, aims to stay in power indefinitely like Mr Chavez.
Reuters