Paraguayan Electoral Justice releases video on general elections

Asunción, May 14 (Prensa Latina) Paraguayan media released today a recording of the Superior Tribunal of Electoral Justice (TSJE) on the elections of April 30, in view of the complaints of demonstrators on an alleged fraud initiated since the beginning of May.

May 14, 2023
11:53

TSJE Director of Technologies, Fausto Von Streber, denied after the electoral body distributed a DVD requests for an audit of the voting machines by the National Crusade party, of former candidate Paraguayo Cubas, whose members are leading the protests.

The recording delivered to the media, he explained, will verify the authenticity of the results of the elections, won by former candidate Santiago Peña, of the National Republican Association-Colorado Party (ANR-PC), with 42 percent of the votes.

The technicians of the TSJE’s Directorate of Information and Communication Technologies defended the security of the electronic voting system, after that body rejected the previous day the vote recount and the audit by means of an Interlocutory Order.

The TSJE will continue after this decision in a normal manner with the analysis of the electoral records carried out so far, and will rule out the also requested opening of a so-called “Envelope Number 4”, which contains unchecked ballots.

The communication of the electoral body argues that the scrutiny of a general election must be carried out in the same place of the voting by the members of the voting table, and not in a private place with only some of the political actors represented.

The former candidate called for protests and road blockades which prospered throughout the country under the accusation of alleged fraud, a claim later supported by other political formations such as the National Alliance of former candidate Efrain Alegre (28 percent of votes) and the Authentic Radical Liberal Party.

The protests, which began on May 1, only hours after the April 30 elections, included violent actions such as the destruction of ambulances and police vehicles, and were repressed by riot police.

Some 10 people were injured and 200 arrested, many of them facing prison sentences of up to five years, as a result of the demonstrations, especially in front of the TSJE headquarters under the leadership of Cubas’ supporters, the latter also arrested and currently being prosecuted by the courts.

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