Summary The law, Mujica's landmark legislative initiative, was passed last December.
MONTEVIDEO, Oct 27, 2014 (AFP) - Leftist former president Tabare Vazquez and his center-right rival Luis Lacalle Pou will head into a November 30 runoff after Sunday s presidential vote failed to deliver an outright winner, exit polls showed.
President Jose Mujica will be succeeded either by his Broad Front ally Vazquez, who earned 46 percent of votes, or the National Party s Lacalle Pou, who garnered 31 percent, according to exit polls.
Some Vazquez supporters had hoped he could squeeze out an absolute majority, but he fell short. In a surprise twist, results from legislative elections showed the Broad Front could win an absolute majority in parliament, a prospect which analysts had considered unlikely.
After preliminary results were announced, thousands of Broad Front supporters filled July 18 Avenue, the main street in downtown Montevideo, honking horns and waving flags.
The election was touted as possibly deciding the fate of Uruguay s world-first marijuana law. It legalized the drug, and aimed to establish a regulated market in which users could grow it at home, buy it from pharmacies or source it from "cannabis clubs."
The law, Mujica s landmark legislative initiative, was passed last December. But implementation is off to a rocky start, and it faces an uncertain future because Lacalle Pou opposes the law.
And even Vazquez, who made anti-smoking legislation the centerpiece of his own presidency, has questioned it and said he would not hesitate to make changes.
"I figured the voting results would go more or less this way," Mujica said on Uruguayan television Sunday evening.
Surrounded by supporters, Mujica -- a former leftist guerrilla famous for living in a humble farmhouse while president and donating most of his salary to charity -- was one of the first to vote in the Cerro neighborhood west of the capital Montevideo.
He arrived in his old Volkswagen Beetle, accompanied by his wife, Senator Lucia Topolansky, vowing: "The country will come out ahead."
Vazquez, 74, is out to reprise his 2004 election win, which ended 174 years of dominance by the South American country s two traditional parties, Pedro Bordaberry s Colorados (Reds) and Lacalle Pou s Blancos (Whites, now officially called the National Party).
Lacalle Pou will need Bordaberry s votes if he hopes to succeed in the second round.
"The hope is still there... We are going to be talking with everyone," Lacalle Pou said Sunday evening at National Party headquarters, shortly before receiving an endorsement from the Colorados, who are backing him in the name of "change
After 10 years in power, the Broad Front (FA) clearly has lost some of its shine with voters -- a feeling exit polls backed up.
Vazquez ran as the candidate of change when he won office in 2004, cruising to victory in a single round as voters punished the two traditional parties for the region s 2002 economic crisis.
He left office with a 60-percent approval rating after getting the economy back on track, passing tough anti-smoking legislation and launching a program to give every public school student a laptop.
When Mujica took office, he took the progressive reform agenda up a notch, legalizing both abortion and marijuana.
But though the FA has presided over 10 years of economic growth -- 4.4 percent last year -- and falling poverty, it has lost popularity mainly because of rising crime, inflation and complaints about the education system.
"I was very afraid of losing," but now "I m happy because we worked months for the Broad Front to win," Irina Goldman, 21, whose face was panted the party s red, blue and white colors, told AFP.
Vazquez now looks set to face a runoff against dynamic young newcomer Lacalle Pou.
The son of a former president, Lacalle Pou, 41, shot up in the polls after unexpectedly winning the National Party primary in June, running on a platform of "positivity" and "fresh air."
"We re very happy with the campaign," he said before casting his ballot.
Bordaberry, 54, the son of a president-turned-dictator who did away with democratic rule in 1973, had trailed in pre-vote polls with 15 to 18 percent. On Sunday, he did not make the cut.
Marring an otherwise incident-free election day, police said two men were killed outside Montevideo when a party banner they were trying to hang touched a high-tension wire, electrocuting them
