BUENOS AIRES, Argentina ? Buenos Aires Mayor Mauricio Macri appeared headed to a run-off in his re-election bid after getting the most ballots in Sunday's vote but short of the majority needed for a first-round victory.
The second round July 31 will pit the first-term mayor against Sen. Daniel Filmus, who was hand-picked by President Cristina Fernandez in hopes of taking down Macri, one of her most prominent opponents.
Official results weren't available yet, but exit polls indicated Macri and Filmus finished first and second in the five-candidate race.
Macri, a conservative businessman and dedicated opponent of the president, decided to seek a second term rather than challenge Fernandez, whose popularity has increased in recent months.
She chose the leftist Filmus to run against Macri and involved herself so personally in the campaign that the race became mostly about whether voters wanted to bring her populist model of governing into the capital's city hall.
The results apparently conformed with opinion polls before Sunday's election that showed Macri with a wide lead, but short of an outright majority.
The capital's 2.4 million voters represent nearly 9 percent of Argentina's voting population, and have frequently sided against the national government. On Sunday, they also were choosing half of the city's legislature, and for the first time they elected local representatives for each of the city's 105 neighborhoods.
Filmus served as education secretary under President Nestor Kirchner, Fernandez's late husband and predecessor, but came up outside the rank-and-file of the Kirchners' wing of the Peronist party.
Macri is a civil engineer who jumped into politics after being president of the popular Boca Juniors football club.
"Macri will make the city more secure, more efficient," businessman Marcero Mitre, 57, said after casting his ballot. "I always vote for the conservatives."
Other voters said Buenos Aires could get more resources if Filmus should be elected and the national and capital governments worked together.
"It will improve the budget," said Gracia Trinidad, a 31-year-old computer programmer who said she voted for Filmus even though she was "not exactly excited" about the choice.
She appeared to be among the many Argentines who expect Fernandez to be re-elected in the presidential election Oct. 23. "Cristina is going to win. It's not like she has much competition," Trinidad said.
Trailing in the mayoral polls were leftist filmmaker Fernando "Pino" Solanas, center-left Sen. Maria Eugenia Estenssoro, and former mayor Jorge Telerman, who complained that both Macri and Filmus fed a polarization in Argentine society.
(This version CORRECTS that there were five candidates, rather than four.)
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