2023-07-10 05:01:00
The ruling party of El Salvador held this Sunday internal elections in which only the candidacy of President Nayib Bukele was registered, a legal process to seek his re-election in 2024 in the midst of a debate on whether or not the Constitution prohibits a second consecutive term. The voting was carried out virtually from seven in the morning to five in the afternoon and the militants who registered and received a code to enter and vote participated.
“We are going to carry out the most democratic and transparent process,” said the Nuevas Ideas party on its social networks. The law obliges the parties that intend to participate in the 2024 elections to hold internal elections to define their candidates. In the absence of rivals, Bukele was the candidate of the ruling party and the current vice president, Félix Ulloa, accompanied him in his presidential formula.
A controversial candidacy
Bukele, 41, announced in September 2022 his decision to seek re-election in September 2022, one year after a change in criteria by the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court. Until before the decision of the constitutionalist judges, elected in a process markedly irregular in the Legislative Assembly with an official majority after removing their predecessors, a president had to wait ten years to try to seek the presidency again.
The resolution states that to seek a new term, the president must request a license “six months before the start of the presidential term.” In other words, Bukele would only govern the first six months of his fifth year and should step away from the presidency in January 2024.
Different lawyers, including the Faculty of Jurisprudence of the state University of El Salvador, point out that Bukele’s re-election would mean the violation of various articles of the Constitution, such as the one that states that the person who has held the Presidency will not be able to “continue in their functions not one more day”.
The polls show Bukele as the winner, whose war against the gangs gave him an approval rating of more than 90 percent of the population, despite the fact that this measure received multiple criticisms from human rights organizations. In addition to his fight against the gangs, Bukele gained control of the state apparatus. Congress recently reformed laws promoted by the government to reduce the number of seats in Congress from 84 to 60 and reduced the number of municipalities from 262 to 44.
The president had already consolidated his power in 2021 with a resounding victory in the legislative elections, after achieving an unprecedented number of deputies. The Nuevas Ideas party also elected this Sunday the candidates who will compete in the legislative and municipal elections, in addition to the candidates for deputies for the Central American Parliament (Parlacen).
Other political parties that plan to run in the 2024 general elections have announced that they will hold their internal elections next week. For example, the Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) presented its candidates for the presidency and vice presidency this Sunday. They are Joel Sánchez and Hilcia Bonilla, both businessmen who were based in the United States and will seek to recover the Executive for the right-wing party.
“Don’t come to tell me how progress develops and how to give opportunities to people… I know him, I’ve done it in the United States, Mexico and El Salvador,” said Sánchez at the presentation of his candidacy. Elections for the president and congressional deputies will be held on February 4, while those for municipal councils and Parlacen will be held on March 3.
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