Peru's electoral authority expects presidential results in mid-May

The chaos of the Peruvian presidential elections does not cease. The results of the polls, which will define who will pass to the second round will be known in mid-May, due to the slowness of the counting and the observation of thousands of electoral records, an official of the electoral authority said this Saturday.

With 93.4% of the tallies counted, the partial results of last Sunday's election show right-wing Keiko Fujimori as the favorite for the runoff, with 17% of the votes. The radical leftist Roberto Sanchez(12%) and the conservative Rafael Lopez Aliaga (11.9%) pfight neck and neck for the second round. The distance between the two widened slightly this Saturday, but it is still tiny: 13,600 votes.

More than 15,000 voting records in the review process

"We plan to have, at least, the presidential results by the second half of May, whichis what we need to determine the second round", said this Saturday to RPP radio Yessica Clavijo, secretary general of the National Jury of Elections. The official related the slowness of the count to thereview process of more than 15 thousand observed tally sheets.

According to Clavijo, 30% of these tally sheets correspond to the presidential election and the rest to the voting of deputies and senators. Lopez Aliaga, former mayor of Lima, is the most critical candidate of the process and is calling for its "absolute nullity" after speaking of "electoral fraud." He has offered rewards of $5,800 for those who send him proof of irregularities.

A presidential election marked by problems

The April 12 presidential election was marked by problems in the distribution of ballot boxes and ballots, which delayed the opening of the day in several polling stations in Lima.

The electoral authority had to extend until Monday the voting for more than 50,000 Peruvianswho were left without voting in 13 locations that did not open on Sunday. "These serious facts of organization have to be investigated and there must be the corresponding sanction," Sanchez said for his part in a press conference this Saturday.

Raid by the Prosecutor's Office at the National Office of Electoral Processes

Prosecutors and police raided the facilities of the National Office of Electoral Processes, organizer of the elections, and the head of the agency, Piero Corvetto, was denounced by the National Jury of Elections, along with three other officials, for alleged crimes against the suffrage.

The discovery on Thursday of four boxes with 1,200 ballot papers in a garbage container in a Lima district deepened questions about the elections, marked by delays in the delivery of electoral material that forced authorities to extend them by one day.

The Public Prosecutor's Office "carries out diligences in the main warehouse" of the National Office of Electoral Processes (ONPE), organizer of the voting, "in order to determine the fulfillment of its functions regarding the electoral material used," said the Public Prosecutor's Office on social networks.