Opposition Wants Election Recount in Honduras

Electoral authorities has not declared an official winner, but results gave a 1.60 percentage point advantage to current President Juan Orlando Hernandez

The Honduran opposition battling President Juan Orlando Hernandez over a disputed presidential election proposed on Tuesday that a run-off be held if authorities would not recount the entire vote.

Opposition candidate Salvador Nasralla said the electoral tribunal should review virtually all the voting cards.

“If you don’t agree with that, let’s go to a run-off between (Hernandez) and Salvador Nasralla,” he said on Twitter.

Former President Manuel Zelaya, who was ousted in a US-backed 2009 coup, said that the opposition was seeking a total recount of the vote, or legislation to permit a run-off, which is not used in Honduras.

Authorities took a week to count votes in the nation of 9 million people. The tribunal has not declared an official winner, but the results gave a 1.60 percentage point advantage to Hernandez over Nasralla, who says tally sheets from ballot boxes were altered and has declared himself the rightful winner.

Street protests in favor of Nasralla that began last week continued on Tuesday afternoon. Dozens of people, including police officers, gathered at the Tegucigalpa headquarters of Honduras’ elite police force yelling “Out, JOH,” referring to Hernandez’s initials.