Electoral Blow in Honduras: Libre Announces "We Will Take to the Streets"

"We will be there, the women, the men, the families, standing tall, without cowardice, without bowing our heads to friend or foe," declared presidential candidate Rixi Moncada.

"We will never recognize elections of trickery, of cunning, of artifice, and of deception of the people" of Honduras, asserted the candidate of the Libre party, Rixi Moncada. She once again denounced the manipulations and pressures exerted to alter the results of the November 30 elections, including the hacking of the TREP (Preliminary Results Transmission System), the tampering with electoral records, as well as interference from the United States and a coercive media campaign against voters.

"We stand with our people, with those who voted for us, and also with the people who did not vote for us, coerced, threatened, besieged by millions of messages telling them 'if you vote for Rixi, you will not have remittaces,'" said Moncada, announcing that "with the people, victims of coercion, blackmail, threats, we will take to the streets. You will see it soon."

During an extraordinary assembly of the Liberty and Refoundation (Libre) party in Siguatepeque, in the central department of Comayagua, the presidential candidate stated that the party's general coordination had filed all requests and taken all legal actions to annul the elections. "Not only have we demanded the annulment of the elections, but we have also challenged all 19,000 polling stations in light of the coercion and threats that prevailed in the electoral process," she affirmed.

Accompanied by Libre's coordinator, Manuel Zelaya, she emphasized that "we will continue to exercise, as we did in 2013 and 2017, all legal actions, with dignity, with honor, with our heads held high."

She added that "we all know what happens with justice in Honduras, which is the serpent that bites the barefoot, locked away in its chambers, terrified by imperial power. If the people are strong outside, we can have hope for justice inside, but if outside we are divided and disorganized, inside the situation of justice will become more serious every day."

She maintained that she would not remain silent before the country's wealthy class "because truth and the spirit of struggle guide us." Referring to how to motivate the base, she noted that "the people know what to do to motivate the base: it is unity, organization. Out with betrayal, out with disloyalty, and out with the 'raccoons.'"

Amidst chants of "Out with 'raccoons'!" from the attendees, the Libre candidate reiterated: "Unity and organization to confront organized crime, always keeping in mind the main battle cry of June 28, 2009: we are not afraid of them."

A Mafia Changed the Election
Moncada reiterated the accusation of open interference by Donald Trump in the electoral process, threatening "consequences" if Libre won and giving his support to the candidate of the right-wing National Party, Nasry Asfura, in addition to pardoning former president Juan Orlando Hernández, who was serving a 45-year sentence in New York for drug and weapons trafficking.

Trump's interference, Moncada said, "changed the election in Honduras. The imperial mafia, united with the national mafia, organized crime, drug trafficking, not only changed the election but also set the drug lord free, set the convicted drug trafficker free, and today the people, I am sure, are judging that double-standard action."

During the Libre assembly, evidence of the fraud committed in the electoral process was presented, which Moncada denounced as an "assault" and "ambush by imperial and national organized criminality."

Libre filed a request one week ago to annul the tabulation of the presidential elections held last Sunday, November 30, based on irregularities that alter the popular will.

The claim, filed before the National Electoral Council (CNE) by Libre's legal representative, Edson Javier Argueta Palma, argues that "an action for administrative annulment of the tabulation conducted by the 19,167 polling stations (JRVs) for the presidential election is presented, due to the disaster of the results transmission system through which the preliminary tabulation was conducted and the final general tabulation is being executed, adulterating the popular will."

The legal demand asks that "the CNE redo the election in each and every one of the JRVs for the presidential level due to the disaster and failure of the preliminary results transmission system and the final general tabulation, which offers no reliability." Among other irregularities, it mentions "the thousands of errors reported across the country from the scanning of the records and in the different modules up to the dissemination" and the fact that the tabulation, in this context, "violates every rule of transparency and fairness of the electoral process, jeopardizes the legality of the results, affects the very foundation of democracy, and deeply violates the right to vote."

On Friday, Honduran authorities reported that they had filed complaints with the United Nations (UN), the Organization of American States (OAS), and the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) regarding the interference of U.S. President Donald Trump in the November 30 elections.

"Under instructions from the President of the Republic, Xiomara Castro, from the Foreign Ministry we have sent Official Notes denouncing the interference in our elections by the President of the United States, Donald Trump," said the Undersecretary of Foreign Policy, Gerardo Torres.

The Vice Chancellor specified in a post on his X social media account that they also informed these bodies about "the coercion suffered by the population through threats from criminal groups and the failure of the electoral results transmission and dissemination system."

Two days prior, the National Congress of Honduras warned that it would not recognize the election results, citing electoral fraud and external interference.

In a statement, the Permanent Commission of the National Congress of the Republic denounced "the existence of an ongoing electoral coup, materialized through coordinated actions that seriously affected the integrity, transparency, and legitimacy of the electoral process held in the country" and condemned "in absolute terms the interference of the President of the United States, Donald Trump, who, through public statements 72 hours before the elections, threatened and coerced Honduran citizens, altering the free exercise of suffrage."

In the statement, Congress warned that it *"will not validate a process tainted by internal pressures from structures of organized crime linked to drug trafficking, gangs like MS-13, 18, among others, much less by external pressures and the direct violation of voters' freedom."*

Despite repeated allegations of irregularities and manipulation and the evidence of fraud presented, the National Electoral Council (CNE) has continued the tabulation with a special recount of votes from 2,773 ballot boxes with inconsistencies. With 99.40% of records tallied, the candidate of the National Party, Nasry Asfura, supported by Trump, leads the results with 1,298,835 votes (40.52%).