Peru's ex-president Alan Garcia led a runoff election on Sunday by a narrow margin over Nationalist ex-army commander Ollanta Humala, exit polls showed.

A statistical projection, based on a sampling of 91 percent of ballots, indicates Garcia won 52.8 percent of the vote against 47.2 percent for Humala, said the Apoyo polling firm, adding that the margin of error was about 1 percentage point.

The figures were echoed by another exit poll conducted by the Dantum International firm, which said Garcia garnered 55 percent against Humala's 45 percent of the vote, based on almost 27,500 interviews.

"Garcia is essentially Peru's president-elect," Apoyo Director Alfredo Torres said in an interview with American Television. But Humala's supporters said it was too early to admit defeat.

Official figures were to be released by National Electoral Process Office a few hours after the close of voting stations.

Sunday's vote is a run-off between two left-wingers, who won the most votes from a 20-strong field of first round candidates.

The exit polls are in line with voting intentions published on May 26, but with one major difference: last month, 23 percent of those polled said they remained undecided.

Garcia, 57, won just over 24 percent in the April 9 first round vote while Humala, 43, gained just short of 31 percent.

Polls closed at 4.00 p.m. local time (2100 GMT) on Sunday without major incidents. Reports from the Organization of American States said the elections were carried out normally, with only minor incidents, such as late opening at some polling stations.

Some 16.5 million Peruvians are eligible to vote in these elections.

Garcia held Peru's presidency from 1985 to 1990, during which the Latin American country was mired in guerrilla violence and economic chaos. But he said during the election campaign that he had learned from the mistakes of his 1985-1990 term and would better manage Peru's economy.

Humala, who described himself as a center-left democrat, is feared by Peru's middle and upper classes. He denounced them as corrupt and regardless of the needs of the poor, and vowed to amend the constitution to deprive them of power.

Analysts said many Peruvians showed apparent preference for Garcia, who was dubbed "Latin America's Kennedy" at the age of 35 when he was elected the nation's president, regarding him as the lesser of the two evils and less hostile to business.

Garcia was educated in the Law Department of Catholic University in Lima and the National University of San Marcos. He became a lawyer in 1972 and then continued to study in Spain, France, Britain and the Netherlands. He gained a doctor's degree in law and sociology.

He has pledged to scrap any free-trade deal with the United States and raise taxes on the mining industry, the main engine of Peru's economy.

Source: Xinhua