The president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, has 1,662,313 votes, with 70.25% of the preliminary count by the Superior Electoral Court (TSE), which recognized difficulties in transmitting the results from voting centers.
With these results, which must be ratified in a final count with physical minutes, a process that takes several days, Bukele would have an overwhelming advantage over his opponents.
Behind the current president, from the ruling party Novas Ideias (NI), are the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN, left-wing), with 139,025 votes, and the National Republican Alliance (Arena, right-wing), with 122,926 votes.
The parties Nosso Tempo (NT), Força Solidária and Força Patriótica Salvadorenha are below NI, FMLN and Arena. Novas Ideias also leads remote voting abroad via the internet and in person. The electoral body has not yet provided preliminary statistics on the total number of voters and abstentions.
On the morning of this Monday (5), the body recognized several actions that hindered the development of activities for transmitting preliminary results from voting centers, which is why it agreed to the manual issuance of the minutes.
Social media users reported irregularities in the transmission of ballots during the counting, which in many polling stations lasted until this morning.
Celia Medrano, vice-presidential candidate for the Nosso Tempo party, told journalists this Monday that the Electoral Court “is not capable” of “verifying any of the data that was publicly announced based on the proof of voting ballots versus the system electronic device that failed everywhere.”
On Sunday night (4), Bukele proclaimed himself the winner of the election with more than 85% of the votes and announced, even without official data, that NI would continue to dominate the Legislative Assembly with 58 deputies out of a total of 60. However, the Electoral Court processed only 5% of the legislative vote counts, officially.
Having a majority in Congress will allow Bukele, who if confirmed would become the first president of El Salvador to be re-elected, to continue his war against criminal groups through an exceptional regime, implemented since March 2022.
The popularity achieved by this measure, which reduced the number of homicides in the country, considered for many years as one of the most violent in the world, helped the young president, aged 42, win the presidential and legislative elections held on Sunday.
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