Challenger holds surprise lead in Honduras presidential vote

TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras — The main challenger to Honduras’ president held an unexpected lead Monday in early returns from the presidential election, then o cials stopped releasing results and the ruling party continued to claim victory while readying its supporters to take to the streets.

David Matamoros, president of the electoral court, announced around 2 a.m. that with 57 percent of the votes counted from Sunday’s election, Salvador Nasralla had 45.7 percent to 40.2 percent for conservative President Juan Orlando Hernandez.

Hernandez, an ally of the U.S., had gone into the election predicted to win based on his popularity for fighting crime, but his party also drew heavy criticism for getting a court to override the Honduran constitution’s ban on consecutive presidential terms. And corruption cases also tainted the administration.

Turnout in Sunday’s vote appeared to be heavy across the country, with relatively minor irregularities reported.

The electoral court went silent after announcing the initial partial results, leaving many people asking whether attempts were being made to change the outcome.

Julio Navarro, a sociologist and political analyst in Tegucigalpa, criticized the electoral court. “It keeps failing us,” he said. “Last night it promised o cial results early and didn’t give them to us until dawn and still hasn’t o ered more information.”

Nasralla called for his supporters to celebrate in front of the electoral court’s o ces, while Reynaldo Sanchez, president of the ruling National Party, sent a recorded message to party members saying it was time “to prepare our people to defend the triumph in the streets.”

The Electoral Observation Coaltion N-26, a nonpartisan civil society group, expressed concern at the silence from election o cials.

“The lack of o cial data generates unnecessary speculation in the population, is unsettling and does not favor the transparency and legitimacy of the process,” the group said.

Manuel Orozco, a senior fellow with the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, said it would be embarrassing for the government to back away from the preliminary results.

“The international community has been working with them. They all say that the election process, the election itself seemed to be clean and not violent,” he said. “It would really be very surprising that Juan Orlando (Hernandez) could win with the vote from some of the rural communities. If anything I think they are probably discussing how to present the results.”