September 02 2015, 13:59
- Next Sunday, September 6, Guatemalans will head to the polls to elect the President and Vice President, Congress (158 deputies), Central American Parliament (20 deputies), and Mayors and councils for its Municipalities (338).
- Authorities will be elected for a four-year term.
- A two round system is used for the election of the President. If no candidate receives more than 50% of the vote, the second round will be held on October 20.
- Congress is elected through a closed-list proportional representation system.
- 7 million Guatemalans are eligible to vote in these General Elections. Only people under 18 years of age, imprisoned citizens, expats and members of the armed forces will not be able to cast a ballot.
- Incumbent President, Otto Pérez Molina, who was stripped from his immunity this week by congress, is not eligible to run due to constitutional term limits.
- The Tribunal Supremo Electoral (TSE), the highest elections authority in Guatemala, called for the elections on May 2. Since, it has regulated campaigns fining parties for anticipated campaigning and even suspending Partido Patriota and Libertad Democrática Renovada for repeated offenses.
- Guatemala’s legal framework does not allow electronic voting. All voting and counting will be done manually. To streamline the processing of election results, TSE will use a Central Count Optical Scan (CCOS) system to digitize count reports.
Image by:
sisterlmonkey0 via Pixabay
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_Guatemala
http://www.electionguide.org/countries/id/90/
http://www.tse.org.gt/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=140&Itemid=184
