Nasry Asfura, the conservative National Party candidate endorsed by US President Donald Trump, has been declared the winner of Honduras’s presidential election after weeks of uncertainty caused by technical failures and political विवाद.
The National Electoral Council (CNE) said Asfura won 40.3% of the vote, narrowly beating Salvador Nasralla of the centre-right Liberal Party, who secured 39.5%. The election took place on 30 November, but repeated disruptions to the vote-counting system delayed the release of the final results.
Following the announcement, Asfura said in a social media post that he was ready to govern and pledged not to disappoint the Honduran people.
The outcome was immediately rejected by opposition figures. Luis Redondo, president of Honduras’s Congress, labelled the result “completely illegal,” while Nasralla accused “corrupt elements” of manipulating the vote count. Electoral officials said technical problems forced around 15% of tally sheets to be counted by hand.
CNE president Ana Paola Hall blamed a private contractor responsible for tabulating the votes, saying the firm carried out unannounced system maintenance that caused major outages. Public confidence was further shaken after the online results portal crashed during the counting process.
The delays sparked widespread protests across Honduras, particularly among supporters of the governing Libre party. Outgoing President Xiomara Castro alleged an “electoral coup” and claimed the process was affected by interference from the Trump administration. She pointed to Trump’s warning that there would be “hell to pay” if Asfura’s narrow lead was overturned, along with threats to cut US financial support.
Tensions intensified after Trump pardoned former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández, a senior figure in the National Party, who had been serving a 45-year prison sentence in the United States on drug trafficking and weapons charges.
Despite the controversy, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio called on all sides to respect the official outcome to ensure a peaceful transfer of power. He said Washington was prepared to work with Asfura’s incoming government on regional security, migration and economic cooperation.
With President Xiomara Castro constitutionally barred from seeking a second term, Honduras now faces a delicate political transition as opposition leaders continue to question the legitimacy of the election results.
