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Juan Luis Manzur won the contested election by around 110,000 votes. (photo: Wikipedia)
The province’s highest legal authority ruled that the election was valid, in spite of a number of irregularities, and that Frente Para la Victoria (FpV) candidate Juan Manzur should be officially declared governor-elect.
According to the final recount, Manzur won the election with 51.4% of the vote, comfortably ahead of Acuerdo para el Bicentenario (APB) candidate José Cano, who received 39.9%.
However, the Electoral Court was unable to proclaim an official winner until the Administrative Appeals Court of Tucumán ruled on APB allegations of fraud.
Last Thursday, the court determined that the elections should be annulled and a new vote held after stating that the “electoral process had been corrupted”.
Incidents Did Not Affect Result
The unanimous decision of the provincial Supreme Court was based on the decision that the registered incidents of irregularities (including burned or stuffed ballot boxes, outbreaks of violence, and defects in the custody of the ballot boxes) were not sufficient to warrant annulling the entire election.
Judge Carlos Ibáñez noted that there were irregularities recorded in only 62 out of 3,601 voting stations, an insufficient number to affect the outcome. “The serious and public nature of incidents that took place on 23rd August cannot be ignored. But neither can the serious implications for democracy and republican government that annulling the elections have,” wrote Ibáñez in the ruling. “The transgressions realised should be punished by other means, but did not – in this case – have a significant influence on the final result.”
Judge Raúl Bejas confirmed in a radio interview this morning that specific irregularities should not be motive to annul the entire election. “These issues of violence and clientislism, though damaging and unacceptable, have to be widespread. You can’t annul elections because of concrete and isolated acts of violence,” Bejas told Radio Continental. “This scale is not something that a judge decides. The National Electoral Code determines that 50% of the ballot boxes have to be nullified.”
The ruling also highlighted that the existence of clientelism, while undermining the democratic process, does not necessarily signify that votes are not cast freely. However, it urged provincial authorities to take measures to end the “scourge of clientelism” and evaluate whether reforms should be made to “perfect the electoral system”.
Reaction
Manzur celebrated this morning’s decision among crowds of FpV activists, stating that “the only thing we wanted was for the vote of the people to be respected.”
Cano said that he would respect the court’s ruling, but would appeal the decision at the Federal Supreme Court. “We are going to follow republican paths to demonstrate that there was fraud that altered the popular will in Tucumán. Our lawyers have already prepared the appeal before the National Supreme Court, which we hope will resolve the issue as soon as possible,” said Cano.
The Electoral Court indicated that it would proclaim Manzur as the official winner tomorrow.
The post Tucumán: Provincial Court Overturns Decision to Annul Elections appeared first on The Argentina Independent.