Honduran general election, 2017
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General elections were held in
Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. The republic of Honduras is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Oce ...
on 26 November 2017. Voters went to the polls to elect the
President of Honduras The president of Honduras ( es, Presidente de Honduras) officially known as the President of the Republic of Honduras (Spanish: ''Presidente de la República de Honduras''), is the head of state and head of government of Honduras, and the Comm ...
to serve a four-year term, as well as 128 members of the unicameral
National Congress ''National Congress'' is a term used in the names of various political parties and legislatures . Political parties *Ethiopia: Oromo National Congress *Guyana: People's National Congress (Guyana) *India: Indian National Congress *Iraq: Iraqi Nati ...
, 20 members for the
Central American Parliament The Central American Parliament ( es, Parlamento Centroamericano), also known as PARLACEN, is the political institution and parliamentary body of the Central American Integration System (SICA). Its headquarters are in Guatemala City. History ...
and mayors for the
municipalities of Honduras Honduras is administratively divided into 18 departments which are subdivided into 298 municipalities. Municipalities are the only administrative division in Honduras that possess local government. Each municipality has its own elected mayor ...
. The elections were the first after the
constitution of Honduras The Political Constitution of the Republic of Honduras () was approved on 11 January 1982, published on 20 January 1982, amended by the National Congress of Honduras 26 times from 1984 to 2005,Dates of ratification. and 10 interpretations by Co ...
was amended to allow for a president to seek re-election, a controversial development since the mere possibility of changing the constitution to allow for re-election was a primary justification for the
2009 Honduran coup d'état The 2009 Honduran coup d'état, part of the 2009 Honduran constitutional crisis, occurred when the Honduran Army on 28 June 2009 followed orders from the Honduran Supreme Court to oust President Manuel Zelaya and send him into exile. Zelaya h ...
. The sitting president,
Juan Orlando Hernández Juan Orlando Hernández Alvarado (; born 28 October 1968), also known as JOH, is a Honduran lawyer and politician who served as President of Honduras from 2014 to 2022. A member of the National Party, Hernández previously served as the presi ...
had been the favorite going into the elections, but early results showed a significant advantage for his major challenger,
Salvador Nasralla Salvador Alejandro César Nasralla Salum (born 30 January 1953) is a Honduran sports journalist, television presenter, businessman, and politician who has served as the First Vice President of Honduras since 27 January 2022. He is the pres ...
. As the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) slowly announced the vote totals, Hernández gained in the vote counts amid numerous irregularities, leading to cries of electoral fraud and protests across the country. The protests escalated over the next several days as the country awaited final results, and on 1 December, Juan Orlando Hernández's government issued a ten-day curfew to try to control the protests. Following the elections, both candidates claimed victory. On 17 December, twenty-one days after the elections, Hernández was declared the winner by the TSE, which is dominated by Hernández loyalists.Elisabeth Malkin
Honduran President Declared Winner, but O.A.S. Calls for New Election
''New York Times'' (December 17, 2017).
The
Organization of American States The Organization of American States (OAS; es, Organización de los Estados Americanos, pt, Organização dos Estados Americanos, french: Organisation des États américains; ''OEA'') is an international organization that was founded on 30 April ...
(OAS), which conducted independent monitoring of the elections, found widespread irregularities in the conduct of the voting and doubted the validity of the official results. The OAS called for fresh elections.


Background

Hernández was seeking re-election, having won the 2013 contest against Xiomara Castro and
Salvador Nasralla Salvador Alejandro César Nasralla Salum (born 30 January 1953) is a Honduran sports journalist, television presenter, businessman, and politician who has served as the First Vice President of Honduras since 27 January 2022. He is the pres ...
in a controversial election marred by accusations of vote buying, fraud, intimidation, and other irregularities. This time around, Castro's Libre party united with the Innovation and Unity Party behind Nasralla in the Alliance against the Dictatorship, but concerns over the integrity over the process remained, especially when ''
The Economist ''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Econo ...
'' revealed a recording of what appeared to be a training session for poll workers from Hernández's National Party that included advocating for vote-rigging in five different ways as part of the party's strategy.


Electoral system

The President of Honduras is elected by plurality, with the candidate receiving the most votes in a single round of voting declared the winner. The 128 members of the National Congress are elected by open list
proportional representation Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to geographical (e.g. states, regions) and political divis ...
from 18 multi-member constituencies based on the
departments Department may refer to: * Departmentalization, division of a larger organization into parts with specific responsibility Government and military *Department (administrative division), a geographical and administrative division within a country, ...
ranging in size from one to 23 seats.Honduras: Election for Congreso Nacional
IFES
Seats are allocated using the
Hare quota The Hare quota (also known as the simple quota) is a formula used under some forms of proportional representation. In these voting systems the quota is the number of votes that guarantees a candidate, or a party in some cases, captures a seat. Th ...
.


Presidential candidates

Juan Orlando Hernández Juan Orlando Hernández Alvarado (; born 28 October 1968), also known as JOH, is a Honduran lawyer and politician who served as President of Honduras from 2014 to 2022. A member of the National Party, Hernández previously served as the presi ...
of the National Party, who has held office since winning the 2013 election, is the first president in Honduran history running for a second term since the constitution established in 1982, despite the fact that, Article 374 of the
constitution of Honduras The Political Constitution of the Republic of Honduras () was approved on 11 January 1982, published on 20 January 1982, amended by the National Congress of Honduras 26 times from 1984 to 2005,Dates of ratification. and 10 interpretations by Co ...
prohibits both presidential reelection and the altering of the article prohibiting reelection.
Manuel Zelaya José Manuel Zelaya Rosales (born 20 September 1952)Encyclopædia BritannicaManuel Zelaya/ref> is a Honduran politician who was President of Honduras from 27 January 2006 until 28 June 2009, and who since January 2022 serves as the first Fir ...
was ousted by a coup in 2009 for holding the
Honduran fourth ballot box referendum The ''cuarta urna'' or fourth ballot box referendum was a plan by Honduran president Manuel Zelaya to run a non-binding referendum to consult the public regarding the administration of a second, binding referendum to convoke a constitutional assem ...
, which some have claimed he was using to alter this article of the constitution. Comments he made shortly before being deposed seem to suggest he did believe the referendum would be effective in such a capacity. It is important to note that because Zelaya could not run for office in the 2009 election, this change would have been made after he was out of office."Honduras president: Nation calm before controversial vote"
CNN, 27 June 2009.
Therefore, Zelaya would have only been able to run for reelection in 2013. The left-wing
Libre Libre may refer to: Computing * Libre software, free software * Libre Computer Project, developer of open-hardware single-board computers Medicine *FreeStyle Libre, a glucose monitoring device Media * Libre Times, news site which people can free ...
and PINU parties formed with the centre-right Anti-Corruption Party the Opposition Alliance against Dictatorship for this election, nominating PAC founder
Salvador Nasralla Salvador Alejandro César Nasralla Salum (born 30 January 1953) is a Honduran sports journalist, television presenter, businessman, and politician who has served as the First Vice President of Honduras since 27 January 2022. He is the pres ...
as its candidate. Former Honduran president
Manuel Zelaya José Manuel Zelaya Rosales (born 20 September 1952)Encyclopædia BritannicaManuel Zelaya/ref> is a Honduran politician who was President of Honduras from 27 January 2006 until 28 June 2009, and who since January 2022 serves as the first Fir ...
, who was forced out of office in the coup in 2009, supported Nasralla and acted as a political strategist for the Opposition Alliance's campaign. The centrist Liberal Party nominated former president of the
Central American Technological University The Central American Technological University ( es, Universidad Tecnológica Centroamericana) (UNITEC) is a private coeducational institution with campuses in the three main cities of Honduras: Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula and La Ceiba. History ...
Luis Orlando Zelaya as its candidate.


Election administration

The President of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, David Matamoros Batson, stated that the election budget is 1.098 million Honduran lempiras. Foreign officials from the United States Embassy,
Organization of American States The Organization of American States (OAS; es, Organización de los Estados Americanos, pt, Organização dos Estados Americanos, french: Organisation des États américains; ''OEA'') is an international organization that was founded on 30 April ...
, and
European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...
conducted election monitoring.


Results and aftermath

The polls closed at 16:00 local time (UTC−5) on election day, a change from years past when polls had closed at 17:00. Supporters of the opposition saw this as an attempt by the TSE, which is effectively controlled by Hernández's National Party, to suppress the vote. After voting, the TSE planned to begin releasing vote totals as they came out, but suspended the process for close to seven hours. Before any official results had been announced, Hernández declared himself the victor, and Nasralla followed by also claiming victory. The following day, the TSE released its first preliminary results: with 57% of the votes counted, Nasralla held a 5-point advantage over Hernández, with 45.17% to Hernández's 40.21%. The TSE then halted the count for 36 hours and announced that final results may not become available until Thursday, 30 November. Over the course of the week, the TSE released updated vote totals, which saw Nasralla's lead steadily erode and Hernández pull ahead in the vote count. After the TSE again paused in its vote totals for several hours, claiming to have experienced a glitch in the computer system, Nasralla denounced the TSE for fraud, declared he would not recognize the results, and urged his supporters to take to the streets, which they did across the country. According to an analysis done by
Georgetown University Georgetown University is a private university, private research university in the Georgetown (Washington, D.C.), Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789 as Georg ...
professor Irfan Nooruddin for the
Organization of American States The Organization of American States (OAS; es, Organización de los Estados Americanos, pt, Organização dos Estados Americanos, french: Organisation des États américains; ''OEA'') is an international organization that was founded on 30 April ...
, there was a sudden swing in the vote totals after 68 percent of the votes were counted. Nooruddin concluded that the "differences are too large to be generated by chance and are not easily explicable, raising doubts as to the veracity of the overall result." On 30 November, with approximately 94% of the votes counted, Hernández's lead had climbed to 42.92% compared to 41.42% for Nasralla. On 1 December, the TSE announced that they would give no further results until the TSE had been able to review all of the 1,031 tally sheets which had not been properly filled out by the political parties. The 1,031 tally sheets represent 5.69% of the total vote. Later that same day, as the TSE was still trying to convoke 60 representatives and four supervisors for both Nasralla and Hernández for the final vote count, Hernández's cabinet announced a ten-day curfew from 6pm to 6am to try to calm the violence associated with the protests. On 2 December, the Honduran National Roundtable for Human Rights issued a press release, in which it declared that the government actions were state terrorism against civilians, it warned that the declaration of a state of exception was in order to create repression to ensure
electoral fraud Electoral fraud, sometimes referred to as election manipulation, voter fraud or vote rigging, involves illegal interference with the process of an election, either by increasing the vote share of a favored candidate, depressing the vote share of ...
labeling it as illegal after reading several articles of the Honduran constitution. As of 2 December, at least 7 people had died in the protests with more than 20 injured. On the second night of the curfew, thousands of people participated in what is known as "'' cacerolazos''", banging pots and pans in protest. As of 15 December 2017, the court had finished a recount of ballot boxes that presented irregularities but had still not declared a winner, and protests continued throughout the country, with 16 deaths and 1,675 arrests, according to Honduras' National Human Rights' Commission. The court has 30 days from the contest to do so. The TSE finally announced a winner on 17 December, giving Hernández the victory with 42.95% of the vote to Nasralla's 41.42%. The announcement sparked a new wave of protests across the country, with Mel Zelaya announcing a national strike. The country's two major cities - Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula - saw streets blockaded, their main exits blocked, and traffic between them severely reduced.
Organization of American States The Organization of American States (OAS; es, Organización de los Estados Americanos, pt, Organização dos Estados Americanos, french: Organisation des États américains; ''OEA'') is an international organization that was founded on 30 April ...
(OAS) election monitors, in their final report, documented widespread and numerous irregularities in the conduct of the voting and ballot tabulation, and doubted the validity of the official results. OAS secretary general
Luis Almagro Luis Leonardo Almagro Lemes (; born June 1, 1963) is a Uruguayan lawyer, diplomat, and politician who currently serves as the 10th Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS). He also served as Minister of Foreign Affairs bet ...
issued a statement following the TSE's announcement saying: "Facing the impossibility of determining a winner, the only way possible so that the people of Honduras are the victors is a new call for general elections." Hernández rejected the OAS's position, and his top aide accused of OAS of seeking "to try and steal the election" for Nasralla. ''
The Economist ''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Econo ...
'' analyzed the vote tallies as reported by the TSE and compared that information with census data to analyze the validity of Hernández's explanation for the sudden swing in the vote tallies: that the later votes came from areas with more National Party support. However, ''The Economist'' found that explanation implausible, noting that the swing happened in municipalities, which tend to be small and urban, across the country. The only other explanation for the swing in the vote tally would be that paper ballots favored Hernández by 18 percentage points where electronic ballots favored Nasralla by 5 percentage points, but, as ''The Economist'' noted, the "odds are that that didn't happen".


President


National Congress


Reactions


Countries

Despite concerns over election fraud, the United States recognized Hernández as the winner. However, in a statement, the U.S. Department of State said that "The close election results, irregularities identified by the OAS and the EU election observation missions, and strong reactions from Hondurans across the political spectrum underscore the need for a robust national dialogue" and called for "much-needed electoral reforms should be undertaken." Twenty-seven members of Congress sent a letter to President Trump urging him to "join the Organization of American States in calling for new elections, and to stand behind the right of the Honduran people to free and fair elections, in accordance with Honduran law" and expressed alarm at Honduran security forces's use of force against "civilians protesting electoral fraud." In a separate letter, 20 members of Congress wrote to Secretary of State
Rex Tillerson Rex Wayne Tillerson (born March 23, 1952) is an American engineer and energy executive who served as the 69th U.S. secretary of state from February 1, 2017, to March 31, 2018, under President Donald Trump. Prior to joining the Trump administ ...
expressing concern about the State Department's response to the elections, which the members called "inadequate."Kaelyn Forde & Conor Finnegan
Democracy 'lost': Rights groups warn of more violence in Honduras as US recognizes president
ABC News (December 22, 2017).
Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
and
Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
also recognized Hernández as the winner. In a statement, the Mexican foreign ministry stated: "Mexico respectfully calls for the democratic institutions, the political forces and the people of Honduras, in a mark of respect and agreement, to definitively conclude this electoral process."


The United Nations

On 12 March 2018, the UN Human Rights Office issued a statement about a UN report on Honduras presidential election saying that "members of the Honduran security forces, in particular the military police, used excessive – including lethal – force to control and disperse protests that erupted following November's disputed presidential election". The report "found that at least 22 civilians and one police officer were killed during the protests". The report says, "These cases raise serious concerns and may amount to extrajudicial killings,"


Supranational bodies

* — The OAS said that the official results could not be accepted as valid, citing multiple irregularities. The leader of the OAS's election observation mission, former Bolivian President Jorge Quiroga, said: "The tight margin, along with the irregularities, errors and systematic problems that have surrounded this election, does not allow the mission to be certain about the results." When the final results of the presidential election were announced three weeks after voting, the OAS immediately called for new elections.


References

{{Honduran elections Presidential elections in Honduras
Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. The republic of Honduras is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Oce ...
2017 in Honduras 2017 general November 2017 events in North America Election and referendum articles with incomplete results