Chileans are voting to pick a new president and Congress as more than 15 million registered voters will decide whether the country stays on its current centre-left course or, like its neighbour Argentina, makes a sharp turn to the right.

Polls opened at 8am (11:00 GMT) on Sunday and are expected to close at 6pm (21:00 GMT) as one of the Latin American country’s most divisive elections in recent times got under way.

A change from the previous elections is mandatory voting for registered voters.

The starkly divided frontrunners are Jeannette Jara , the 51-year-old governing coalition candidate from the Communist Party, and Jose Antonio Kast, 59, of the Republican Party who promises “drastic measures” to fight rising gang violence and deport undocumented immigrants.

Polls suggest that

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