( CNN ) -- Pollsters in Peru said Sunday that left-leaning Ollanta Humala looks poised to win the presidency , defeating rival Keiko Fujimori in a polarizing runoff election that pits the county 's left and right against each other . Early exit polls released as voting closed at 5 p.m . ET gave Humala as much as a 5-percentage-point lead over Fujimori , the daughter of a former president who 's serving a 25-year sentence for human rights abuses . Pollster CPI showed Humala with 52.5 % of the vote and Fujimori with 47.5 % . Ipsos Apoyo said Humala would win 52.6 % of the ballots cast , while Fujimori would trail with 47.4 % . A watchdog election group later released a quick count of ballots , showing Humala would win with 51.5 % of the vote , vs. Fujimori 's 48.5 % . Official results are not expected until later Sunday . Still , supporters of Humala celebrated in downtown Lima , cheering the early results , waving flags and hoisting banners . One read : `` Ollanta , Presidente . '' Peruvians went to the polls Sunday to pick their next president in a runoff election between two candidates with little in common . Humala , 48 , narrowly lost a 2006 election bid , in part because many saw him as a close ally of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez , intent on turning the country to the left . That 's a point his rival , 36-year-old Fujimori , a right-wing lawmaker , hammered on throughout her campaign . At a closing rally last week in Paseo Colon , a historic avenue in the capital of Lima , Fujimori went on the offensive as she addressed a crowd of thousands . `` There are recordings and witnesses that prove that this gentleman is a good soldier of Chavez , '' she said to cheering crowds . `` I am not going to allow other countries to interfere in the sovereignty of our country . I 'm going to defend it ! '' Humala , a former army officer linked to a 2000 military uprising , has tried to distance himself from such perceptions , swapping his trademark red T-shirts for suits this time around . In a recent interview with CNN en Espanol , he denied his goal is a Chavez-style social revolution in Peru . `` When we speak about revolution , we 're speaking about a revolution in education , which is something fundamental , '' Humala said . `` We have to build our own future . We believe that the Venezuelan model does n't apply in Peru . '' Like her opponent , Fujimori was forced to answer uncomfortable questions about her past during this year 's election . She is the daughter of former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori , who is currently in prison on a 25-year sentence for human rights crimes . Many Peruvians credit the elder Fujimori with defeating insurgencies that ravaged the South American nation for years and for enacting economic reforms that stabilized the Peruvian economy . However , he is also criticized for corruption , having an authoritarian streak and the widespread rights abuses that were committed under his watch . During the campaign , protesters accused his daughter of planning to grant the former president amnesty if she wins , as she said she might do in a 2008 interview . She has since backed away from those remarks . Centrist candidates , including former President Alejandro Toledo , former Lima Mayor Luis Castaneda and former Finance Minister Pedro Pablo Kuczynski , cannibalized each others ' votes during the first round of voting in April . In that round , Humala garnered more than 30 % of the vote , while Fujimori ended slightly above 23 % . Under Peruvian law , only the top two contenders advance to a second round . Peruvians are required by law to vote and some 20 million people were thought to have cast their ballots in Sunday 's election . After the elimination of the more centrist candidates in April , Peru 's 2010 Nobel literary laureate Mario Vargas Llosa , a former presidential candidate himself , described the race as a choice between `` terminal cancer and AIDS . '' Andrea Stiglich , a member of the Economist Intelligence Unit team of Latin American analysts , said the election was a triumph of extremes . `` This election was meant to be the election of a centrist policy continuity candidate , and what we have is a first round that has yielded a result between two extremes in the left and the right , '' she said before the second-round vote . Current Peruvian President Alan Garcia is not permitted to run for a consecutive term . `` I will get behind whoever wins , '' he said on Sunday , before voting closed . `` The task ( of running the country ) is not easy and they ( will ) need everyone 's support . '' The new president will face many of the same challenges Garcia did : Persistent poverty , protests around the rights to natural resources and violence from remnants of a leftist insurgency that helped to make Peru the world 's largest producer of coca , the raw ingredient of cocaine . On the eve of the election , five soldiers were killed in an attack in the country 's southern province of Cusco , state news said . They were reportedly on their way to provide local police with additional security for the election when they were ambushed . CNN 's Dana Ford contributed to this report .
Lima : A quick count of votes and exit polls put Ollanta Humala ahead . NEW : Supporters of the former army chief rally in downtown Lima . Centrist candidates face each other during the first round of voting .