Election Day El Salvador March 11th 2012

by Frikard Ellemand

One thing that really surprised me during the municipal and legislative assembly elections of El Salvador 2012 was what you could call the mood of the day. I had expected strong tensions - only 20 years have passed since the signing of the peace accords marked an ending to the war between left and right in the country. Since then the old guerilla has transformed itself into a political party growing stronger and stronger each passing election culminating in winning the presidency in 2009. The political climate in El Salvador is extremely polarized. There is no love between the two big parties, and the newcomer GANA, being a split from the old right wing Republican Party ARENA, doesn’t exactly make things more romantic. Considering what happened during the 12 year civil war it would have come as no surprise if things were tense.

However the actual “feel” of the day was all but tense. Yes, I did hear the stories of hard discussions and petty rejections over what were obviously only formalities, but what I saw and heard that day myself was quite the contrary. Let me give you some examples. Several of the tables were in good spirit and one table in particular was joking all day long, even to a point where they would make technically improper remarks (“…and thank you for casting the correct vote”) but instead of calling upon the electoral authorities to complain, the members of the rivalling parties would laugh and come up with something equally jokingly offensive (“...because we all know what you voted!”).

Another case would be the vote count. During our training we have been prepared to expect that every possibility of contesting a vote would be taken, even to the point were it the voters intention would be blatantly obvious – in short really bad sportsmanship. But what I actually met at the table during the count was a harsh but fair count. Only one vote was contested (the ink had bled through and marked another x) but after a short dispute they decided to give vote to the CD vigilante whose party was not even represented in the Junta of the table (“she only has three, let her have it!”).

Combining those examples with a very tranquil day were the worst incident was the return of the drunken voter who was refused earlier, leaves me slightly confused; are they really the same people who stopped killing each other 20 years ago? It very well might be that it was not a presidential election and that I was observing in a very partial and therefore quiet part of the country, but that aside I couldn’t recognize the expectations of pettiness and bitter rivalry we were given during the training. Whether this is a tendency or not is an open question but what it does show is that at least it is possible for people to move on in order to make the democratic process work. One can only hope that the good sportsmanship shown on this occasion will reach the higher levels of the electoral institutions.