Honduran president declares election win, rival claims lead
TEGUCIGALPA, (Reuters) Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, a centerright U.S. ally, cited multiple exit polls yesterday to declare himself victorious in a bid for a second term in the Central American nation, despite the opposition saying it was winning.
A poll released by network Televicentro, generally considered a reliable indicator of results, gave President Juan Orlando Hernandez 43.93 percent of the vote, with Salvador Nasralla, who leads a broad leftright coalition called the Opposition Alliance Against the Dictatorship, at 34.70 percent.
“The count is more than clear and resounding that we won this election, that is what the polls say and that is what the results we are seeing from the count are saying,” Hernandez told supporters at a Tegucigalpa hotel.
Blue-clad Hernandez supporters danced and blew horns, while his wife, Ana Garcia de Hernandez, led a prayer.
The election tribunal was not due to release even partial official results until later in the evening. A candidate does not need a majority of votes to win. The opposition alliance said early numbers gave it a strong lead but added it would only accept physically counted ballots that tendencies could still change.
“We are winning,” Nasralla told a more subdued group of supporters, while also floating the possibility the results would be less favorable later in the night.
Hernandez bid for a second term has angered other parties, not least because eight years ago, while a lawmaker, he supported a coup that removed an earlier president after he proposed a referendum on re-election.
Hernandez, 49, is popular, however, for lowering a sky-high murder rate, accelerating economic growth and cutting the deficit since he took office in 2014 in one of the Americas’ poorest, most violent countries.