OREANDA-NEWS. Former Honduran first lady Xiomara Castro is leading the country's presidential election on 28 November.

Castro was congratulated on his victory on 30 November by US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, although the results are still being counted. After processing more than half of the ballots, she received 53.6% of the vote, while Nasri Asfura received 33.89%.

Castro, 62, will thus become the first woman to govern Honduras. Her victory marks the left's return to power after a 12-year gap. The national party came to power in a coup d'état in 2009 when Castro's husband, President Manuel Zelaya, was overthrown.

The delayed announcement of the election results brought back memories of the 2017 elections in Honduras, when the opposition candidates' gap suddenly began to shrink after the National Electoral Council suspended the counting. These events caused intense discontent among residents and led to violent protests.

Nevertheless, for the moment there has been no unrest in the Central American country, given the substantial difference of 20%. Castro hailed her "resounding victory" after her supporters celebrated the likely departure of President Juan Orlando Hernández, accused of corruption and involvement in the drug trade.

Honduras is not the only state in Latin America where a woman becomes president. In Argentina, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner was president from 2007 to 2015 and in Brazil, Dilma Rousseff was in power from 2011 to 2016. There are currently two women presidents in Latin America - Paula May Weeks in the island nation of Trinidad and Tobago and Sandra Mason in Barbados.