Government dismisses concerns over 'secure' electronic ballot system

Frontrunner candidate Jair Bolsonaro, who won the first round of the presidential election on Sunday, blamed problems with electronic polling for denying him an outright victory.

The far-right candidate will face leftist Fernando Haddad in the run-off on October 28 after winning 46 percent of the vote to Haddad's 29 percent in the first round.

"For us it is a matter of pride we have an electoral system that is absolutely secure and trustworthy," Brazil's Foreign Minister Aloysio Nunes told reporters during a visit to Lisbon on Wednesday.

"Of course, it is possible in such a vast country that there are problems with some polling stations but they are resolved immediately."

The minister said the ballot system allowed results to be tallied in a matter of hours and was monitored by election observers.

Bolsonaro, a former paratrooper vowing to crush crime in Latin America's biggest nation, did not formally contest Sunday's result.

But his supporters protested outside the national electoral tribunal in the capital Brasilia, chanting "Fraud!"

"I am sure that if they had not happened then we would already have the name of the president of the republic tonight," Bolsonaro said during a Facebook broadcast where he discussed polling problems.