World

Rightist Wins El Salvador Vote

By CBSNews.com staff CBSNews.com staff

March 8, 1999 / 8:26 AM EST / CBS

El Salvador's governing rightist party won an overwhelming victory over its leftist rivals in presidential elections, avoiding a second-round runoff, according to official figures Monday.

With 94.47 percent of the votes counted, Francisco Flores, a 39-year-old former philosophy professor, was declared the winner, claiming 51.96% of the votes cast. His nearest opponent, former leftist guerilla Facundo Guardado, garnered just under 30% of the vote.

It is the third consecutive five-year presidential term for the Republican Nationalist Alliance and a bitter setback for the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front. The FMLN converted from a guerilla coalition into a political party with the 1992 peace treaty that ended El Salvador's civil war.

Flores conducted a media-heavy campaign that shied away from the party's traditional attacks on its foes as communists, a strategy that seemed to help smooth divisions still existing from the war.

"We have not conducted politics against our adversaries, but in a positive way," Flores told a news conference Sunday night.

He vowed to work to "control the crime wave, combat poverty and harmonize the demands of the present with the demands of the future."

Thousands of flag-waving supporters cheered Flores in a street celebration before the headquarters of his party, known as ARENA, where Flores paid homage to party founder Roberto D'Aubuisson, who died of cancer in 1992.

The transition from D'Aubuisson to Flores is a dramatic sign of the country's changes. D'Aubuisson was linked by the United States and United Nations to right-wing death squads -- and to the assassination of a Roman Catholic archbishop -- during El Salvador's civil war.

Flores then was studying political science and then philosophy in Massachusetts and California. He spent time in India with the Hindu swami Sai Baba, who advocates nonviolence and tolerance, as well as patriotism and the observance of established religions. Flores is a Roman Catholic.

Flores took no part in the civil war, but was scarred by the conflict that killed 70,000 people: His grandfather and father-in-law died as a result of leftist attacks.

He joined the government as an administrator in 1990 and ran for congress in 1994. He was the head of ARENA's congressional delegation when he was nominated to succeed businessman Armando Calderon Sol as president.

During the campaign, he called for further openings of El Salvador's economy, for a battle against rising crime and for expanded, often privately run efforts to help the 40 percent of Salvadorans who live in poverty.

His victory was marred only by a low turnout of roughly 40% following the tranquil campaign.