MANAGUA, Nicaragua (Reuters) -- Opposition Sandinista candidates won key
                  positions nationally, including the mayoral post in Managua, in local elections
                  earlier this month, electoral officials said on Tuesday.

                  The Sandinista Liberation Front won 49 of 151 mayoralties up for grabs,
                  including 11 of 17 state capitals, the Electoral Council told a news conference in
                  releasing final results. The ruling Liberal Party won 97 mayoral elections, while
                  the Conservative Party won five in the Nov. 5 elections.

                  In Managua, Sandinista Herty Lewites was elected mayor over Liberal Party
                  candidate Wilfredo Navarro. The capital has been in the hands of the Liberal
                  Party since 1990, when current President Arnoldo Aleman took office as mayor.

                  The outcome of these local elections is seen as a positive sign for the Sandinista
                  party ahead of next year's presidential election. The population in municipalities
                  to be governed by Sandinistas amounts to about half the Central American
                  nation's 4.8 million people.

                  Sandinista leader and ex-President Daniel Ortega has said he would again run for
                  president next year, after losing the office in 1990 to Violeta Chamorro and in
                  1996 to Aleman.

                  The leftist Sandinista regime took power in 1979 after overthrowing the Somoza
                  family dictatorship. But the U.S.-backed Contra uprising and economic disaster
                  weakened the party, and the Sandinistas left power in 1990 with Ortega's loss.

                     Copyright 2000 Reuters.