Voting in a runoff for a new president in North Macedonia is underway Sunday, Reuters reported.

About 1.8 million voters will choose between two candidates who got through to the second round.

The ruling coalition’s candidate, a long-serving public official and academic, Stevo Pendarovski, and his main rival, the candidate of the nationalist VMRO-DPMNE, Gordana Siljanovska-Davkova, were neck-and-neck in the first round two weeks ago.

The main concern is that if voter turnout falls below 40 percent in the second round the election will be declared invalid. In that case, the speaker of parliament would become interim president and new elections would have to be held.

Turnout in the first round of voting was 41.6 percent.

Polling stations will be open until 7pm local time, with the first preliminary results due two hours later.

The presidency is a largely ceremonial post in North Macedonia, but he or she is the supreme commander of the armed forces and also signs off on parliamentary legislation.