Nayib Bukele Reelected President of El Salvador Despite Constitutional Prohibition

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Issue Jan 31-Feb 06 2024: On February 4, 2024, El Salvador’s President Nayib Bukele went on social media and declared himself reelected “with more than 85% of the votes” even before the official election results were released. Bukele, at 42 years of age, was the first head of state to run for re-election since the end of the civil war in 1992, ignoring a Constitutional ban on consecutive terms. He also hung onto the docile congressional majority he won two years ago. The Salvadoran legislature happily allowed him to declare an ongoing state of emergency, beginning on March 27, 2022, through which he has waged his “war” on “gang violence,” leading to the arrest of some 76,000 people. According to various polls, his offensive against gangs in El Salvador has proven to be wildly popular with the vast majority of Salvadorans, though the election was plagued by widely reported irregularities and outright intimidation and fraud. According to the final results, he romped over the other four candidates including Manuel Flores of the Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional (FMLN, left), and Joel Sánchez, of the Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (ARENA, right), the two parties that shared power before Bukele’s Nuevas Ideas (NI) shot to power. Pundits around the region were ready with ample offerings.

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