Toronto elects new mayor, ending troubled era

Toronto voters replaced their notorious mayor, Rob Ford, on Monday and rejected an attempt by his brother, Doug Ford, to take the city's top job, electing instead a conservative politician and broadcaster who promised to unite a city divided by four years of scandal and vitriol.

John Tory, a former Progressive Conservative Party leader in Ontario, won the election in a closer-than-expected race, according to the city's election website, fighting off a strong challenge by Doug Ford.

With about 99 percent of the ballots counted, Toronto's election website showed Tory with 40.3 percent of the vote, ahead of Doug Ford's 33.8 percent. Olivia Chow, a left-leaning former federal politician, came in third with about 23 percent of the vote.

Tory, riding on a groundswell of anyone-but-Ford sentiment, was endorsed by every major newspaper in Toronto, Canada's largest city, with about 6 million people in the greater metropolitan area.

He has pledged to improve Toronto's overcrowded and aging public transit, identified by most voters as a top priority during the campaign.

But Rob Ford, who made global headlines last year when he admitted to using crack cocaine while in office, was easily elected to the city council in a western Toronto ward, a stronghold for the close-knit political family that has a base of supporters dubbed Ford Nation.

Rob Ford withdrew from the mayor's race in September after being diagnosed with malignant liposarcoma, an aggressive type form of cancer, in his abdomen. He is undergoing treatment in Toronto.

He threw his support to his brother, a city councilor, who took his place on the mayoral ballot, and ran for city council instead on a populist platform of keeping taxes low and ending waste at City Hall.

Elected with about 59 percent of the vote in the ward Doug Ford held, Rob Ford said he would continue to fight for the ordinary people and hinted at bigger goals in the 2018 elections.

Reuters