Sergio Massa

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By Katy Watson in Buenos Aires & Malu Cursino in LondonBBC News

Argentines will have to choose between left-wing candidate Sergio Massa and The far-right Javier Milei in a run-off vote next month, partial results from Sunday's presidential election suggest.

With most ballots now counted, no candidate has received More Than 45% of votes - The threshold to be elected.

The outcome has surprised most pollsters, who thought voters would punish Mr Massa for presiding over a major crisis as economy minister.

Inflation in Argentina is nearing 140%.

Front-runner Mr Milei was leading in The polls prior to The vote, but Mr Massa has received 36. 2% of ballots So Far .

Mr Milei has received 30. 2% of The votes, according to partial results.

Sunday's election saw a voter turnout of 74%, according to local media.

Argentina's pre-election polls are notoriously inaccurate, and failed to predict Mr Milei's rise in August's primaries.

Argentina has witnessed a rise in support towards The far-right politician, who has vowed to scrap The Central Bank and replace The Argentine Peso with The US dollar.

As well as pledging a shift in economic policies, Mr Milei has campaigned to reduce government offices in what he says would reduce bureaucracy in government.

Current economy minister Mr Massa and former security minister Patricia Bullrich were Mr Milei's main opponents ahead of Sunday's vote. The pair are two big hitters from Argentina's traditional coalition.

Mr Massa focused much of his campaign in defending The Peronist movement's social and labour credentials.

The 51-year-old insisted that austerity measures passed by his government were The result of The IMF debt run up by The previous centre-right administration.

The partial count suggested that 23. 8% of votes had gone to right-wing Ms Bullrich, who had pledged to restore " order" to The country. She was security minister between 2015 and 2019 during Buenos Aires 's centre-right leadership.

Trailing behind all three candidates were politicians Juan Schiaretti and Myriam Bregman .

This surprise twist puts Mr Massa in First Place , despite assumptions from many people that Mr Milei would be The Star of The Show .

The unpredictable Results Now means uncertainty for another four weeks until The run-off on 19 November - at a difficult time for The economy.

What appears certain, though, is that whoever wins The presidential election will have a huge job on their hands: to win over a country Fed Up with politics, and which is filled with people desperate for their lives to improve.

Polls before Sunday's vote had suggested The presidential race could indeed to go to a run-off.

For a candidate to win outright in The First round they would have needed to secure More Than 45% of votes - or 40% plus a margin of 10 percentage points over The closest rival.

As well as choosing its new president and vice-president, Argentinians also voted for 130 new representatives for The lower house of Congress, which has 257 members, and 24 new senators for The 72-member upper house.

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Source of news: bbc.com