Daniel Ortega, an ex-rebel leader and a former president of Nicaragua, was catapulted back to power on Tuesday, thanks to the strong support of the nation's poor.

Preliminary results of Sunday's presidential election showed that Ortega won 38 percent of the votes, against the 29 percent gained by his closest opponent, Eduardo Montealegre.

Ortega, who will turn 61 next Sunday, is the leader of the Sandinista National Liberation Front, which has been in opposition since 1990.

Ortega joined Sandinista in 1963, which later overthrew the government of dictator Anastasio Somoza in 1979. He was first elected president of Nicaragua in 1984, but was voted out of power in 1990.

Ortega participated in the presidential elections in 1996 and 2001, but failed in both these attempts for a comeback.

During this year's campaign, Ortega promised to establish a government of peace and national reconciliation after his election, and take measures to lift the impoverished Central American nation out of poverty.

Ortega pledged to stem inflation, set up development banks aiming to provide loans to agrarians and small businesses, create jobs, and set the development of the health and education sectors as priority, among his other economic prescriptions for the country.

Ortega won Sunday's election despite stern warnings from Washington that it would cut aids to Nicaragua if he was elected.

In the 1980s, the then revolutionary-leftist Ortega government fought a bitter war with the Contra rebels backed by the United States for years. Ortega ran for reelection in 1990 but lost to Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, the first of the three directly Washington-backed presidents.

Source: Xinhua