The current mayor confirmed that they submitted writings to the TSE on Tuesday to revise 17 disputed votes, which could change the outcome.
Arcatao, one of the FMLN bastion municipalities, is on the cusp of falling into the hands of the New Ideas party politically, as explained by the current mayor, José Alberto Avelar, who manages the Salvadoran border for three consecutive terms.
Avelar told El Diario de Hoy yesterday that according to the number of votes at the end of election day, the difference is one vote in favor of New Ideas.
The hope of reversing that defeat rests on 17 votes that were identified as disputed. The candidate the FMLN has bet on is not Avelar, the current mayor, but Bladimir Orellana.
As a result of this disagreement, they submitted a letter to the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) on Tuesday asking for such votes to be reviewed.
The last hope the leaders have is that after this evaluation the outcome will be in favor of the Front, Avelar said.
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For that reason, the TSE had not communicated the final results of that municipality shortly before 12:00 yesterday, according to the mayor.
However, by mid-afternoon, the website set up by the TSE to obtain real-time information on preliminary election results indicated an advantage for New Ideas over the FMLN. New Ideas received 819 votes, one more than the Front.
Municipal records indicate that in Arcatao the electoral roll has 2,680 voters, of whom usually about 1,500 voted; but in the recent elections, the mayor believes that 1,650 have voted.
DATA AND FIGURES
VOTES: According to the preliminary vote, the New Ideas party would have won the mayorship of Arcatao with one vote.
“The ideology has not been lost”
Avelar does not believe that the number of votes generated by New Ideas means that the Front has lost supporters in the congregation or that the ideology among them has been lost.
Avelar says he is confident that his party’s loud voice will remain intact and that the party that lost its voters was the Nationalist Republican Alliance party, ARENA.
The ARENA party had a stronghold in Arcatao, according to Avelar. This was the canton of Teosinte, a place repopulated by paramilitaries or ex-police officers. There is always a polling station there with about 900 voters.
Traditionally, the mayor confirms, ARENA has obtained 400 votes in that place, but this time it only got 10 and the FMLN lost 60 votes.
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The official continues in his comments: he believes that the flow of votes that New Ideas received was due to the central government’s millionaire campaign and the purchase of wills.
Avelar claims there were people who got $ 50 to vote for NI.
“It is considering collecting all the evidence that can be presented to the Prosecution to set a precedent. Even on election day, they handed out the tickets to claim a carton or half a carton of eggs (30 or 15 pieces), ”he said.
Chichilco effect
Arcatao is the birthplace of María Ofelia Navarrete de Dubón, better known as María Chichilco, a pseudonym she used when she was a fighter and leader of the Popular Liberation Forces (FPL), during the armed conflict.
Currently, the former guerrilla commander is Minister of Local Development and in the presidential election that brought Nayib Bukele to the presidential seat, Chichilco also supported him.
Avelar admits that there are people in the congregation who respect Chichilco and has no doubts that, as a community leader, she also influenced the results.
However, Avelar remains hopeful that the TSE should resolve the disputed votes on the request they made. “It has to be done for health,” he said.