A tense and nerve-wracking battle between Trump’s “Palestinian” candidate and the “Lebanese” candidate • For the second time in days – Trump rudely interfered in the elections, provoking tensions and criticism • The election website crashed, and the results have been “stuck” for many hours; Trump threatened: “They will pay a heavy price”
Honduras entered a particularly tense night when the presidential race “stuck” yesterday (Monday) in a “tie”. The two leading candidates – Nasri “Tito” Espora from the right and Salvador Nasrallah, a former TV host running on behalf of the Center Party – stood at a little less than 40% each, and the difference between them is only 515 votes.
Trump intervenes: “They will pay a heavy price”
Alongside the drama in the local election system – it seems that a large part of the tension comes from the USA. While the National Election Commission of Honduras called on the public to remain “calm and patient” until the end of the manual counting, US President Donald Trump published a post tonight in which he claimed that “Honduras seems to be trying to change the election results”. He warned that if this happened, “they will pay a heavy price!”
Trump, who openly supports Espora, claimed that the count “came to an abrupt halt.” In practice, a final update was published yesterday at noon (local time) – about 9 hours before Trump’s post – and the delay was expected due to the transition from counting the digital votes to the manual counting of ballots, a normal process in the local election system.
This was not the only event in which Trump rudely interfered in the elections and caused an uproar: last week he warned that the US would not continue to invest money in Honduras if Espora did not win, called Nasrallah a “communist”, and even said that he would call former President Juan Orlando Hernandez, who is serving 45 years in prison in the US for drug smuggling, from Espora’s party.
His words were received in Honduras as a blatant American intervention. Infrastructure and Transportation Minister Octavio Pineda said that this is “electoral interference” by the US President. This is not the first time that Trump has intervened and threatened to harm the country financially if his preferred candidate is not elected. About a month ago, he threatened that if the party of Argentine President Javier Millay did not win the parliamentary elections, he would stop investing in the country.
The leading candidates: one Palestinian, one Lebanese
Espora, the son of parents of Palestinian descent, tried to restore his party’s image after years of scandals, and was careful not to associate himself with former president Hernandez, who was convicted of drug trafficking in the US. He said he had “no connection” to the former president and that the party was not responsible for his actions.
Nasrallah, the son of parents of Lebanese origin, who is identified with an anti-corruption agenda, is seen by many as a chance to turn a new page, especially after years of crisis and his departure from the government of Siomara Castro, which he served as vice president for a short period.
The website crashes, the count is delayed – and the tension increases
57% of the votes were counted until yesterday afternoon, but since then no further update has been published. The Election Commission’s website crashed – it seems, due to overload – and this only increased public concern.
In 2017, there was exactly such a delay in the counting of votes, which caused claims and speculations about an attempt to damage the purity of the elections. Then, following the delays, demonstrations and riots broke out that ended with 20 deaths. This time too, this delay was enough to ignite a riot, but mainly from Trump’s side and not from the citizens’ side.