Polling stations for Colombia’s presidential elections closed at 4 PM on Sunday with electoral watchdogs receiving almost 500 complaints of electoral irregularities.
As votes continue to be counted results will be released by Colombia’s Registry Office throughout the evening with final results expected by 10pm.
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Throughout the election day 285 complaints of electoral irregularities were submitted to Colombia’s independent Electoral Observation Mission (MOE) with the Interior Ministry recording 495 complaints.
Of these complaints, most came from the central state of Tolima with 21.8%, followed by the northern state of Atlantico and the northwestern state of Antioquia.
The elections were also used by the residents of Isla Baru, an island off Colombia’s Caribbean coast, to demonstrate a feeling of longstanding negligence by the national government by collectively deciding not to vote.
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Incumbent president Juan Manuel Santos will hope to edge out candidate Oscar Ivan Zuluaga for the Democratic Center (Centro Democratico – CD) along with Enrique Peñalosa for the Green Alliance (Alianza Verde -AV), Clara Lopez for the POLO Democratic Party (POLO Democratico) and Marta Lucia Ramirez for the Conservative party (Partido Conservador).
With regards to the election process, one candidate must win at least 50% of the votes otherwise the elections will go into a second round with the two front-runners going head to head on June 15. Going into the elections the two poll front-runners have been Zuluaga and Santos despite both candidates being involved in scandals during their respective campaigns.
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Such calm during the voting has arguably been made possible by a unilateral ceasefire enacted during the election period by Colombia’s two largest guerrilla groups, the FARC and ELN.
A bomb planted at a hydroelectric construction project has been the only report by the authorities with any links to the armed rebel groups. However, the home-made device was not placed in the vicinity of any polling stations, and no damages or injuries were reported.
Furthermore a countrywide ban on alcohol and firearms was also put into place Saturday night and will continue through Monday morning in order to ensure a peaceful election process.