[BBC] – But a defeat for Mr Moreno, who has the backing of Mr Correa and his party, would signal a swing to the right after a decade of left-wing policies and could have implications not just for Ecuador but the region.

When Mr Correa was first elected in 2007, he was one of a group of left-wing leaders in power in Latin America, including Argentina’s Nestor Kirchner, Bolivia’s Evo Morales, Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Cuba’s Raul Castro, Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega and Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez.

Some observers spoke of a “pink tide” sweeping across the continent.

A decade on, Argentina and Brazil are led by conservative presidents, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro faces a hostile legislative and Evo Morales is on his last term after Bolivians rejected a proposal to change the constitution to allow him to run again.

All eyes are now on Ecuador to see which way it turns. Partial official results in Ecuador’s presidential election have put governing party candidate Lenin Moreno in the lead.

With 87.2% of the votes counted, he has 39.09%, just short of the 40% needed to win outright in the first round.

If he fails to reach 40%, he will face conservative candidate Guillermo Lasso in a run-off on 2 April.

Third-placed candidate Cynthia Viteri said she would support Mr Lasso in the case of a second round.

Polls conducted before the election suggested that Mr Lasso could win a second round if he got the backing of candidates eliminated in round one.

Mr Moreno needs to both win 40% of the vote and have a 10-percentage-point lead over the next candidate to stave off a second round.

He currently has a 10.8-percentage-point lead but not the 40% of the vote.

Final results are expected later on Monday.

Why does it matter?

After 10 years in power and three election wins, incumbent left-wing President Correa was not running again, so change at the top was inevitable.

But a defeat for Mr Moreno, who has the backing of Mr Correa and his party, would signal a swing to the right after a decade of left-wing policies and could have implications not just for Ecuador but the region.

When Mr Correa was first elected in 2007, he was one of a group of left-wing leaders in power in Latin America, including Argentina’s Nestor Kirchner, Bolivia’s Evo Morales, Brazil’s Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Cuba’s Raul Castro, Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega and Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez.

Some observers spoke of a “pink tide” sweeping across the continent.

A decade on, Argentina and Brazil are led by conservative presidents, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro faces a hostile legislative and Evo Morales is on his last term after Bolivians rejected a proposal to change the constitution to allow him to run again.

All eyes are now on Ecuador to see which way it turns.