TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras.- the National Electoral Council (CNE) began until last night to open the suitcases of the first departments that arrived from the three parties in contention with the commitment to offer results from March 16.
The general secretary of the collegiate body, Alejandro Martínez, Has reported that until last night they had entered the cellars of the National Institute of Vocational Training (INFOP) one hundred percent of the material of Francisco Morazán, Islands of the Bay, two municipalities of the Paradise and two of Comayagua.
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At night it was waiting for the arrival of the rest of the towns of Comayagua and the vans with the other documents of the Paradise, Lempira, Intibucá, La Paz, Columbus, Copán, Ocotepeque, Santa Barbara were already on the way , Choluteca and Valle.
“We will start at 9:00 pm by destroying (opening) the suitcases and removing the electoral documents, once we have several acts we will proceed to the scan and then the fingering,” said Martinez.
“Tomorrow (today) will be a heavier day because we will already have a lot of events that we are going to digitize,” said the official, who has always been keen to speak to the press.
Scanning will be simultaneous
The original closing acts with the result of each of the 23,880 tables corresponding to the three parties (National, Liberal and Free) will be scanned and digitized simultaneously so that each political institute has information at the three elective levels.
The process of arriving at an electoral suitcase takes its time because it first passes into the hands of the municipal commissions that receive them from the villages and hamlets.
They are then handed over to the departmental electoral commissions and these are passed on to the Armed Forces (FAS), which, in coordination with the transport custodian, takes them to the capital’s wineries.
Once in the capital they have to take turns to unload and then open the suitcase, look for the original closing act that is in the possession of the CNE and the copies that must come for each movement.
In the case of the National Party there are two copies for its currents, three for the Liberal Party and ten for the Free Party.
“When we start scanning the minutes, we will go with the three levels and the three political parties to be fair in the information that will be disseminated,” said the secretary general of the collegiate body.
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the results
If the scanning and digitization of the proceedings began at midnight, the first results would be available to the public today in the morning.
If digitization started later, “we believe that tomorrow (today) afternoon and past there will already be a trend of the three political parties and we will have the candidates who are shaping up winners,” the official said.
Martinez estimated that between Thursday and Friday this week, the CNE will have already scanned and digitized one hundred percent of the 23,880 acts at a rate of 7,960 for each party in dispute.
Access to information
The political parties and their currents each have a computer room installed, in the case of the National and Liberal parties, in the Hotel Plaza Joan Carles i Lliure in Honduras Maya.
Each party will be able to see the movement of their acts on giant screens installed in these hotel centers.
The CNE will also be disseminating the results through its website and through the bulletins announced by its president on Sunday night. Sala Ana Paola.
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Delays by winery
One of the reasons why the governing body of the elections took so long to start the period of opening the suitcases was because until yesterday they gave him an enlarged cellar which he ordered to be built.
It happens that these same suitcases will be used in the general election and as there are 14 parties that will participate it was necessary to buy suitcases with 50 percent larger than the current ones.
This change led to the fact that they did not fit in the previous space and therefore a new one was built, explained the Secretary General of the CNE.
For the political analyst Julio Navarro there is one aspect that must be recognized in this electoral process: the influx of voters.
Despite the pandemic, people responded and can be said to have saved the process after their development had been questioned for a long time.
Another analyst, Josué Murillo, highlighted the massive presence of young people who are coming to the polls not so much because of political flags, but because of their convictions.
Short-term challenges
Politicians must resume the discussion of the new electoral law with clear rules as soon as possible to avoid problems in the general elections.
According to experts, if the elections are held next November without an effective transmission system and if the interference of the parties in the National Electoral Council (CNE) continues, the situation will be complicated.
There must be a legal body that regulates the integration of the polling stations Receptores, which for now is the issue that has prevented progress with the law whose more than 200 articles were already approved.
“It is a categorical imperative today to have clear rules for conducting general elections and not to be in the race at the last minute doing it in Matacaballo, improvising,” suggested the coordinator of the National Forum of Convergence (Fonac), Omar Rivera.
For his part, Augusto Aguilar, who helped prepare the new electoral law, said that “it is urgent that it be proceeded immediately with its approval and with the Law of the Electoral Justice Court.”
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The National Electoral Council (CNE), meanwhile, “needs to improve in the planning of the process and what we should expect for the generals is that there are three basic problems solved,” said the director of the Dutch Institute for Democracy, Luis León.
He said: “We can not go to a general process without data transmission and counting of votes, because it would be catastrophic; a plan must be made from the distribution of logistics” because there were many failures such as late arrival of the material of table representatives.