SANTIAGO - Chile is heading for a polarised election run-off after hard-right former congressman Jose Antonio Kast finished ahead of left-wing lawmaker Gabriel Boric in the first round of voting. With over 97% of the votes counted, Kast had won 27.94% versus 25.75% for Boric.

A “sizeable gap” had opened up “between them and the rest of the field, although both were well short of the majority needed to win outright”, Reuters said. The vote, described by the news agency as the “country’s most divisive since its 1990 return to democracy”, has split the electorate into “those seeking a shake-up of Chile’s free-market model and those demanding a harder line against crime and immigration”.

Referendum on the future

Voters headed to the ballot boxes yesterday to decide between two “starkly contrasting visions for the country’s future after two years of street protests and political unrest”, The Guardian said.

In the red corner, Boric, “who shot to prominence during Chile’s 2011 education protests”, has pledged to “bury” Chile’s “past as a cradle of neoliberalism imposed under the dictator General Augusto Pinochet”.

Instead, he has pledged to “build a fairer Chile marked by inclusivity, diversity and liberal social values”, the paper added, telling supporters in Casablanca last week they are campaigning for “a state that guarantees rights and dignity”.

In the blue corner is Kast, a “55-year-old former congressman and father of nine” who “has campaigned on a platform of cracking down on crime while defending free markets and traditional values”, reported the Financial Times.