1.
GV Crowds outside polling booths (3 shots)
0.16

2.
SV Mr & Mrs. Bordaberry arriving to vote (2 shots)
0.24

3.
GV PAN ALONG queue to vote to Bordaberrys at end
0.35

4.
SV Ditto and CU Bordaberrys (3 shots)
0.54

5.
SV TILT UP crowds lined up to vote
1.00

6.
SV Bordaberry posing for photographs while voting
1.09

7.
SV Bordaberry leaving voting booth
1.14

8.
SV PAN ALONG voters in queue
1.22

9.
SV Seregni arrives at polling both and jostled by well-wishers (3 shots)
1.33

10.
SV Officials crowded in polling station
1.34

11.
CU Seregni surrounded by officials
1.39

12.
SV Officials
1.41

13.
SV Seregni voting
1.47



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Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: Latest reports from Montevideo indicate that the Colorado party's candidate, Senor Juan Maria Bordaberry, now appears almost certain to capture the Uruguayan Presidency after the most bitterly-fought general elections in the nation's history.

On Sunday (28 November) thousands turned out for the first day of voting in the capital. Long queues stretched hundreds of yards (metres) from polling stations, and when Senor Bordaberry and his wife arrived at their local station to vote, officials made them stand in line like the others. It was more than an hour before polling officers were persuaded to allow them to vote out of turn.

The leader of the "Broad Front" left-wing coalition party, Senor Liber Seregni, also had trouble casting his vote. He was almost mobbed by the enthusiastic crowd at the polling station, and observers said only prompt action by security men and officials prevented him suffering serious injury.

SYNOPSIS: Thousands of people crowded the polling booths in Montevideo on Sunday to cast their votes in the most bitterly-fought general elections in Uruguayan history. Queues stretched hundreds of yards from polling stations, and observers reported that many people fainted in the heat.

When the Colorado Party's candidate, Senor Juan Maria Bordaberry, arrived to vote at his local polling station, he was directed by officials to wait his turn in the queue. He and his wife had to wait more than an hour before polling officers were finally persuaded to let them vote out of turn. Latest reports have indicated that he is now almost certain to win the elections after a hard campaign against 10 other candidates and President Jorge Pacheco Areco, who was attempting to win a plebescite changing Uruguay's constitution to allow him to run for a second five-year term.

Reports also indicate that Senor Bordaberry looks comfortably ahead of his nearest Colorado Party rival in his bid to collect all the votes cast for the ruling party. At 43, he was the youngest of the 11 candidates, and his party held almost 46,000 votes more than its nearest rival after 70 per cent had been counted on Monday night.

Senor Liber Seregni, the candidate for the left-wing coalition Broad Front Party in its first major intervention in Uruguayan politics, was almost mobbed by the crowds when he arrived to cast his vote. Although there was a strong indication that Senor Seregni's coalition could not poll a majority, observers said there were signs that the Broad Front supporters had effectively divided the country between left and right for the first time ever.