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Supreme Electoral Tribunal

Press release of 17 November 1995

I) As the citizenry experienced it, the communications media reported it, and the International Observers reaffirmed it, last Sunday, November 12, the voting for the Election of the President and Vice President, Congressional Deputies, Deputies to the Central American Parliament, as well as Mayors and Municipal Councils, were held in accord with the convocation by this Tribunal. The cutoff of electrical energy which occurred in the early hours of Monday, November 13, whatever the cause may have been, only slowed down the normal process of transmission of the results, for the different electoral procedures which the Vote Reception Committees, the Municipal Electoral Committees, and the Departmental Electoral Committees must carry out. There was also an effect in the sense that, in some municipalities, the darkness was used by groups of sympathizers of political organizations to express, in a way contrary to law, their discontent about the losses of their favored local candidate or candidates.

II) The citizenry can have complete security and confidence that the above-mentioned cutoff of energy could not produce any alteration of the results, since the computer system installed in the Center for Electoral Information (Centro Miguel Angel Asturias), had an emergency energy system (UPS) and, moreover the emergency electric plant of the Cultural Center immediately began to work, which prevented the loss of the information which was already processed. In addition, all the information which is processed have an authentic documental backup, signed by the members of the Electoral Committees, copies of which are in the hands of the electoral authorities as well as of the Supervisors of the Political Parties. To sow doubt, make insinuations of fraud, or worse, unfounded accusations is not to know the Guatemalan electoral system or act in bad faith to the detriment of our own country.

III) The citizenry is informed that the provisional results of the presidential elections throughout the Republic are the following:

POLITICAL ORGANIZATIONVOTESPERCENTAGE
PAN 564,739 36.56%
FRG 341,038 22.08%
UCN-DCG-PSD 199,895 12.94%
FDNG 119,056 7.71%
PLP 80,475 5.21%
UD 55,237 3.58%
DIA 39,392 2.55%
MLN 34,788 2.25%
PP 25,086 1.62%
FUN-PID 18,051 1.17%
PREG 17,454 1.13%
CAMHINA 11,326 0.73%
PDP 8,171 0.53%
PDG 6,583 0.43%
AP-5 6,184 0.40%
CAN 6,063 0.39%
FDP 5,861 0.38%
MD 3,116 0.20%
PCN-MPL 2,121 0.14%
TOTAL VALID VOTES1,544,636100.00%

The foregoing results correspond to 328 municipalities, which represent 99.56% of the electorate of the Republic, with the results of only two municipalities pending (San Miguel Acatan and Tecun Uman), corresponding to 0.44% of the total of registered voters. In these municipalities there have been problems, of which the communications media have already informed the citizenry, and we are in the process of recuperation of authentic documents if possible.

It should be pointed out that the results above are not the definitive ones, which will be published after the review of the count has been made and the relevant impugnations have been resolved.

To date the reviews which have been carried out are satisfactory and show no variations which can be called substantial.

The citizenry should also know that the results of the Program of Internal Mail established by the TSE to supervise the data received via fax and to have an additional authentic backup document with trustworthy information from the Voting Reception Committees and the Municipal Electoral Committees show a correlation of the results in the municipalities from which information has already been received.

IV) The Law of Elections and Political Parties, in regulating the election of the President and the Vice President of the Republic, established in Article 201 that the winning slate must obtain at least fifty per cent plus one of the valid votes cast and indicates that: "If in the first election none of the slates should obtain such a majority, a second election should be carried out, in a period not greater than sixty days and in conformity with the convocation, in which there will be only the two slates which achieved the greatest number of votes in the first elections, and the slate which obtains at least fifty per cent plus one of the valid votes will win the election." The Supreme Electoral Tribunal, upon issuing the Decree of Convocation of Elections, foresaw this situation, such that the definitive presidential election will be held on Sunday, January 7, 1996, in which, in accordance with the above-mentioned law, the slates of the following political parties: PARTIDO DE AVANZADA NACIONAL (PAN), with ALVARO ENRIQUE ARZU IRIGOYEN for President and LUIS ALBERTO FLORES ASTURIAS for Vice President; and FRENTE REPUBLICANO GUATEMALTECO (FRG), with ALFONSO PORTILLO CABRERA for President and CARLOS ANIBAL MENDEZ CABRERA for Vice President.

Guatemala, November 16, 1995