Central America

Analysts predict opposition defeat in 2024 elections in El Salvador

Photo: Diario El Salvador

October 5 |

The low voting intention and preference, according to several polls, that the population maintains towards the traditional political parties for next year’s elections “is irreversible”, therefore, the electoral triumph of Nayib Bukele at the polls is imminent, according to analysts and sociologists René Martínez and Mauricio Rodríguez.

Both agree that it will be difficult for the traditional parties (ARENA and FMLN) to attract more voters, due to the discontent of Salvadorans for the bad management of their municipal and presidential administrations.

Data from the last opinion poll of the Universidad Francisco Gavidia (UFG) indicated that the tricolor presidential ticket [Joel Sánchez and Hilcia Bonilla] has a voting intention of 4.3 %; and the farabundista candidates [Manuel Flores and Wérner Marroquín] of 2.8 %.

In view of this scenario, in the middle of the beginning of the legal term for the presidential electoral campaign, Martínez and Rodríguez warned that the opposition parties could resort to the “dirty campaign”, as a mechanism to attack Nayib Bukele, candidate of Nuevas Ideas who will compete for immediate reelection, enabled based on the sentence 1-2021 of the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice which reinterpreted article 152 of the Constitution of the Republic.

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“On the part of the opposition candidates, who together would not even reach 10% of the popular support, what is expected is “dirty war”, false news, defamation, continuous calls to return to the past of corruption and impunity and, above all, promises to remove the regime of exception and release terrorist criminals”, considered Martinez.

The presidential elections are scheduled for February 4, 2024, according to the calendar of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE). In these elections, in addition to citizens residing in El Salvador, the diaspora will also be able to vote by means of electronic voting via Internet and electronic voting in person, according to the provisions of the Special Law for the Exercise of Suffrage Abroad, approved by the Legislative Assembly last year.

Unlike the opposition, analysts valued, Nayib Bukele maintains the leadership in voting intentions and citizen preference, results that will be ratified at the polls, by virtue of his work in favor of Salvadorans, highlighting security with the fight against gangs.

The same UFG survey that projected the unfavorable scenario for the opposition established that the presidential formula of Nuevas Ideas [Nayib Bukele and Félix Ulloa] have a voting intention of 68. 4%, which increases to 87% only with valid votes.

“Re-election is imminent. I believe that if the first presidential term [of Nayib Bukele] was to settle public security, the second term is to empower the country’s economic sectors,” said Rodríguez.

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Related Topics:Central America El Salvador

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