According to Yahoo News:
[caption id="attachment_8361" align="alignright" width="300"]
Tabare Vazquez[/caption]
Tabare Vazquez, who served as president of Uruguay from 2005-2010, easily won Uruguay’s presidential election against rival, center-right candidate Luis Lacalle Pou, returning to power a left-leaning coalition that has helped legalize gay marriage and moved to create the world’s first state-run marijuana marketplace.
The runoff vote counted Vazquez to have 53 percent in support of his reelection. Lacalle Pou, on the other hand, who promised to undo much of the plan to put Uruguay’s government in charge of regulating the production, distribution, and sale of marijuana on a nationwide scale, garnered only 40 percent in support of his election.
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Vazquez, who previously served as President of Uruguay, belongs to the Broad Front coalition, which has been in power for a decade and has passed laws supporting same-sex marriage and a nationwide marijuana marketplace, among many other social issues.
Therefore, Vazquez’s popularity and experience, coupled with current President Jose Mujica’s popularity, as well as the country’s strong economy that remained consistent during Mujica’s tenure, aided in propelling Vazquez’s reelection into office.
This is good news for the marijuana policy reform movement. Hopefully, Vazquez’s tenure in the world’s first state-run marijuana marketplace will demonstrate the successes of regulating marijuana on a nationwide scale and influence other countries around the world to implement sensible marijuana policies.