These are just three of the scandals that have made Sunday’s presidential election in Honduras one of the most watched votes in the country’s history.
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Even before voting has begun, some high-level politicians are alleging that stolen votes are being cast.
For example, outgoing President Xiomara Castro has compared the situation to a “criminal conspiracy aimed at carrying out an electoral coup”.
But experts who spoke to Al Jazeera said the public had become accustomed to uncertainty and turmoil.
After all, Honduras’s democracy is only four decades old, and during that time, the country has struggled with government corruption and even coups.
“Obviously, there is fear of violence or a coup,” said Daniel Valladares, an activist and history professor at the National Autonomous University of Honduras. “But it’s a fear that has always been with us.”
In the final days before the election, Valladares has observed a tense calm in the Central American country.
“The environment is normal,” he said. “It’s the same thing people always say: ‘I hope there won’t be a bad show.'”
unclear voting results
Part of the uncertainty ahead of this year’s election stems from polling numbers. None of the five presidential candidates on the ballot has a definite lead.
However, three are considered to be the frontrunners in this race.
Voters on Sunday are most likely to choose between Rixi Moncada, a candidate from Castro’s left-leaning Libre party; Salvador Nasralla of the center-right Liberal Party; and Nasri “Tito” Asfura of the Conservative National Party.
None of the three have made any definitive headway, and voter polls have fluctuated wildly.
For example, a survey conducted by the Instituto de la Justicia found Moncada lagging behind. He had 25 percent support, compared to Asfura’s 31 percent and Nasrallah’s 40 percent.
Meanwhile, another poll showed Moncada in the lead. More than 44 percent of those surveyed by Mexican firm TResearch supported the leftist candidate, compared to 19.6 percent for Nasrallah and 14.8 percent for Asfura.
Other surveys show the three candidates at roughly a tie.
That ambiguity led to accusations from the major parties in the election, with each side accusing the other of vote manipulation.
For example, Asfura has accused the ruling LIBRE party of using “pressure” and “abuses” against election officials. He threatened to mobilize his supporters in protest.
“Yes, we are going to take to the streets so that there are elections and so that there is democracy and freedom,” he told the television network HCH.
Meanwhile, Moncada in one of his rallies alleged that there was an “illegal” partnership between rival parties to “steal the elections”.
“We will take the necessary steps to protect the vote of every man and woman of Honduras,” he told the crowd.
infighting in the election council
The harsh rhetoric has stemmed from several scandals. But one of the most prominent eruptions occurred in late October.
A government body known as the National Electoral Council (CNE) organizes the country’s elections. It is composed of three officials, elected to represent the country’s three main political parties.
But on October 29, LIBRE representative, Marlon Ochoa, gave audio to prosecutors, allegedly capturing a conversation between his CNE colleague Cosette López and an unnamed military officer.
In the recording, Lopez, who represents the right-leaning National Party, reportedly discusses a plan to sabotage the electoral process by staging a “change in the popular vote” and a possible boycott.
López reportedly said, “I’m sure the army is on our side.”
Attorney General Zohel Zelaya has claimed that the recording is genuine, and has launched an investigation into the incident.
But congressional deputy Tomas Zambrano, who is also shown in the recording, said the audio was “completely false, fabricated and manipulated with artificial intelligence”.
He and Asfura have defended López, calling the investigation a campaign to undermine his authority.
But the audio scandal was not the only conflict to rock the CNE.
Also in October, Roosevelt Hernández, head of the armed forces of Honduras, demanded that the military be allowed to conduct its own calculations of the upcoming election results.
Hernandez is known to be affiliated with LIBRE. CNE president and Liberal Party member Ana Paola Hall condemned their demand as “interference” in the electoral process.
Watchdog groups have echoed those concerns. For example, Human Rights Watch issued a statement saying that the military had “no authority to access, count, transmit, or review the results”.
Trump weighs in
Pressure from abroad is also involved in the electoral turmoil.
Honduras’s largest trading partner is the United States, and the two countries have cooperated closely on issues such as combating drug trafficking.
But right-wing leaders in America have spread misinformation ahead of Sunday’s election, further increasing fears about the integrity of the election.
On Wednesday, US President Donald Trump spoke personally on his Truth social platform.
He endorsed Asfuro, describing the conservative candidate’s two closest rivals as puppets of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
Moncada’s victory, Trump wrote, would hand the country over to “Maduro and his narco-terrorists.” And the US president accused Nasrallah of being a “borderline communist” who wants to split the right-wing vote.
Trump wrote, “The Communists are trying to trick the people by fielding a third candidate, Salvador Nasralla.” “The people of Honduras must not be deceived again. The only true friend of freedom in Honduras is Tito Asfura.”
Trump is not alone in increasing tension in America.
Florida Congresswoman María Elvira Salazar, a Republican, also accused Moncada of being in Maduro’s pocket and said the LIBRE candidate would drag Honduras into “socialist hell”.
Valladares believes the US pressure campaign is the result of coordination with the Honduran right.
“The fact that they have gone so far as to request a member of Congress to write a note (about the election) is appalling,” Valladares said.
ghosts of the past
On the left in Honduras, the pressure has revived memories of the military coup that ousted President Castro’s husband, Manuel “Mel” Zelaya.
The ghost of the 2009 coup still haunts the country. Three years into his term, Zelaya proposed holding a referendum to rewrite the Constitution of Honduras.
But the push and pull was intense. The Supreme Court issued a secret warrant for his arrest, and soldiers forced Zelaya into exile, putting him on a plane to Costa Rica against his will.
Political violence increased after the coup and a series of elections followed, in which right-wing governments were elected each time.
In an October 29 post, President Castro compared that turmoil to current election proceedings.
“The same groups that violated the Constitution in the 2009 coup and perpetrated the electoral fraud of 2013 and 2017 are now attempting once again to suppress the will of the people, spread anarchy, and hijack popular sovereignty,” he wrote.
In an interview with Al Jazeera, biology professor and LIBRE activist Iliam Rivera accused business interests in the country of attempting to destroy the left’s re-election chances.
“There’s a lot of uncertainty out there,” Rivera said. “The Honduran right, funded by the country’s economic power groups, has launched a paranoid media campaign against the LIBRE party candidate, Rixi Moncada.”
Another activist, Guido Aguirre, told Al Jazeera that he feared a repeat of the 2017 election cycle.
“In 2017, there was a ‘blackout’ in the voting system that masked the results in real time,” he said. “We are concerned about what dynamics will happen in 2017.”
Still, Aguirre said, what Honduras is experiencing now is nothing new. He described corruption allegations as an endemic problem that would not be solved by Sunday’s vote alone.
“Fraud has become a common thing in the country,” he said. “Fraud and coups. This has been part of our story.”
The 33-member Organization of American States has already announced it plans to send 100 election monitors to Honduras for Sunday’s vote.
It called on election officials to carry out their work “in accordance with the law, free from interference and undue pressure from any political actor”.
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