Maldives set for presidential run-off FORMER Maldivian leader Mohamed Nasheed has won presidential polls with a big margin but failed to secure an outright win to avoid a run-off later this month, results show. Nasheed, 46, who resigned in what he later called a military-backed coup, garnered 45.45 per cent of the popular vote, but did not cross the 50 per cent mark to win in the first round. He now faces a run-off with his nearest rival, Abdulla Yameen, the 54-year-old half-brother of former president Maumoon Abdul Gayoom who ruled the Maldives for 30 straight years until its first democratic elections in 2008. Yameen polled 25.35 per cent of the vote to challenge Nasheed in the run-off. Yameen barely made it, pushing resort owner and leading businessman Gasim Ibrahim to third place with 24.07 per cent of the valid ballots. The other candidate in the race, incumbent President Mohamed Waheed, came last with a humiliating 5.13 per cent, according to provisional results released by the independent Elections Commission on Sunday. It said 88.43 per cent of the 239,593 electorate turned out to vote on Saturday, the second presidential election since the country adopted a new constitution creating a multi-party democracy in 2008.