• Paraguay's Santiago Pena leads the presidential election against Efrain Alegre, with half the votes tallied
• The conservative ruling party's candidate had 45% of the votes, while the center-left opposition candidate had 28% of the vote
• The election comes as officials are divided on whether or not to support Taiwan's democracy continuously

Paraguay's conservative ruling party presidential candidate, Santiago Pena, was found to be leading the elections against his center-left opposition Efrain Alegre as half the votes were tallied on Sunday evening.

Pena had 45% of the votes, while Alegre had 28% of the votes after half of the votes were already counted. Despite polls officially closing at 4:00 p.m., people could still see long queues and delays, which meant some polling places were still open.

Santiago Pena Leads Paraguay's Presidential Election

In a statement, one observer for the Organization of American States (OAS) electoral mission noted that they had seen high levels of participation all day, noting that voting centers were continuously full.

On top of deciding who the country's next leader of roughly 7 million people would be, voters were looking to determine who would become the following members of Congress and governors, as per Reuters.

One voter, Ramona Oddone, was one of the first in the line to cast her ballot at the Mariscal Francisco Solano Lopez school in the region's capital, Asuncion. She said that she was surprised with all of the young people who were taking part in the vote, which she argued showed how much people wanted change.

The 79-year-old retired schoolteacher added that these people were in dire need of jobs, and she needed a better pension. Another resident, 65-year-old Eugenio Senturion, said he remained loyal to Pena.

Maria Jose Rodas, a 34-year-old mother of three, said that she was still undecided on who to vote for because she was worried about crime. She argued that all of the candidates were the same as her and that they would not be able to bring any change to the country. Her remarks came as a busload of voters arrived at a polling station.

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Paraguay Voters' Desire for Change

Since the 1950s, the Colorado Party, which is the one that Pena is associated with, has dominated Paraguay politics and has ruled for all except five of the last 75 years. However, the party's popularity has begun to drop over a slow economy, and allegations of corruption as the country is now 137th out of 180 nations on Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index, according to Aljazeera.

Alegre said that Pena's mentor and former president, Horacio Cartes, was the country's equivalent of Pablo Escobar. One reporter with Aljazeera, Lucia Newman, noted that Cartes is one of the country's wealthiest and most powerful individuals.

The United States Treasury Department previously sanctioned Cartes for what American officials said was "rampant corruption that undermines democratic institutions." Newman added that he was accused of having ties to drug trafficking and Hezbollah. However, Cartes has denied all of the corruption allegations, said DW News.

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