Saturday 17 January
2009, San José, Costa
Rica
EL
SALVADOR:
Left on Track to Win
Elections
By Raúl Gutiérrez
SAN SALVADOR (IPS)
- The leftist FMLN is
the front-runner in the
polls for Sunday’s
parliamentary and
municipal elections in
El Salvador, and
analysts say a victory
would boost its chances
of winning the Mar. 15
presidential elections.
The analysts consulted
by IPS said that if the
outcome of the elections
matches the latest
opinion poll results,
the Farabundo Marti
National Liberation
Front (FMLN) will have a
real chance of a winning
historic victory in a
country that has
traditionally been
governed by the right.
Álvaro Artiga, a
political scientist at
the Central American
University (UCA), said
Sunday’s elections would
allow political parties
to measure the support
they have managed to
build up in nearly two
years of campaigning.
The elections will be
like a "first round, and
will test the strength
of the parties ahead of
the presidential
elections," said the
analyst, who is the head
of the university’s
political science
graduate programme.
On Sunday, voters will
elect the members of 262
town councils, 84
members of the
single-chamber
legislature, and 20
members of the Central
American Parliament.
Under the country’s
electoral laws,
campaigns can only last
four months in the case
of presidential
elections, two months in
the case of
parliamentary elections,
and one month for
municipal elections.
But both the FMLN -- the
main opposition party --
and the governing
right-wing Nationalist
Republican Party (ARENA)
began to campaign in
mid-2007, in the face of
lax oversight by the
Supreme Electoral Court,
which is controlled by
the right.
The most prestigious and
respected polling firms
in El Salvador give the
FMLN a 7.5 to 15.2
percent lead over ARENA.
An early December poll
by the Instituto
Universitario de Opinión
Pública (IUDOP) found
that the FMLN, a former
guerrilla movement, is
7.5 and 15.2 percent
ahead in the municipal
and legislative
elections, respectively.
And in late December,
the Centro de
Investigación de la
Opinión Pública (CIOPS)
reported that the FMLN
enjoyed an 11.3 percent
and 14 percent lead in
the municipal and
legislative elections.
Jan. 2 was the cutoff
date for publishing
survey results on voting
trends.
Polls commissioned by
conservative media found
that the FMLN had a
narrower lead, of
between 1.5 and 6
percentage points.
The proportion of
respondents who say they
will vote for the FMLN
has grown by at least
two percentage points in
the last few months, in
the midst of a
scare-mongering media
campaign by right-wing
sectors.
A group of 30
Salvadorans complained
to the Social Initiative
for Democracy (ISD), a
local election
monitoring group, that
some state institutions
and private companies
have organised
"informative chats" in
which they warn their
employees that if the
FMLN wins, it will usher
in a "communist
government" along the
lines of the
administration of
Venezuelan President
Hugo Chávez.
ISD director Ramón
Villalta told IPS that
these irregularities are
the result of the
control that certain
political parties have
over the Supreme
Electoral Court and the
lack of clear rules
guaranteeing a
transparent electoral
process, which he said
gives rise to worries
about the possibility of
fraud, since the
election authority has
refused to provide
copies of the voter
lists to the opposition
parties.
The Human Rights
Ombudsperson's Office (PDDH)
is investigating at
least 10 cases of
election-related
injuries and murders.
The head of the PDDH,
Óscar Luna, had urged
all political parties to
sign a "no-aggression
pact" in November.
The campaign for the
municipal and
legislative elections
ended Wednesday at
midnight with caravans
and rallies in the
capital.
The FMLN guerrillas
demobilised after a 1992
peace agreement put an
end to El Salvador’s
12-year civil war.
Far-right death squads
were blamed by a United
Nations-sponsored Truth
Commission for the
majority of the 75,000
killings and 8,000
forced disappearances
committed during the
armed conflict.
Christian Democratic and
Social Democratic
parties won the
presidential elections
in 1972 and 1977, but
the military resorted to
fraud and repression of
opponents, leaving a
number of them dead or
"disappeared" and
forcing many to flee
into exile, in what
historians see as one of
the catalysts of the
civil war.
Even if the FMLN
performs well in
Sunday’s elections, it
will not be able to win
a simple majority in
parliament (43 seats),
and the alliance of
right-wing parties will
continue to dominate the
legislature.
The other parties taking
place in the elections
are the right-wing
Christian Democratic
Party (PDC) and National
Reconciliation Party (PCN)
and the centre-left
Democratic Change (CD)
party and Democratic
Revolutionary Front
(FDR).
The FMLN, which has
failed to win the
presidency in three
elections since 1994,
has chosen Mauricio
Funes, a popular
talk-show host and
former CNN
correspondent, as its
presidential candidate
-- a move that will
enable the party to draw
voters who would not
have cast their ballots
for one of its long-time
leaders, according to
analysts.
"The FMLN’s strategy in
nominating Funes is
smart," while "people
see the ARENA candidate
as more of the same,"
Nelson Zárate, head of
CIOPS, told IPS.
Opinion polls referring
to the presidential
elections show that
Funes enjoys a lead of
16 to 17.3 percentage
points on his ARENA
opponent Rodrigo Ávila.
The Organisation of
American States (OAS)
has sent 82 election
observers and the
European Union has sent
40 for Sunday’s poll. In
addition, a number of
research centres and
non-governmental
organisations will send
thousands of their own
observers around the
country to monitor the
vote. |
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