(Updates with latest partial results)
By Gabriel Stargardter and Gustavo Palencia
TEGUCIGALPA, Nov 24 (Reuters) - The conservative ruling
party candidate claimed victory in Honduras' presidential
election on Sunday as a partial vote count put him ahead, but
his leftist rival also said she was the winner, setting the
stage for possible conflict.
The electoral authority said a partial count of votes gave
National Party candidate Juan Hernandez some 34.3 percent
support while Xiomara Castro, wife of deposed former leader
Manuel Zelaya, had almost 28.7 percent.
The preliminary tally was based on a count from 54.5 percent
of polling booths. The electoral authority said it would give
its next update after midday on Monday.
A Hernandez victory would deal a blow to Zelaya, who was
ousted in a 2009 coup that plunged Honduras into a political
crisis. He had hoped to stage a comeback behind Castro.
Hernandez posted a photograph on Twitter of himself and
supporters praying on their knees. "Thanks to my God, and thanks
to the people of Honduras for this triumph," he wrote.
It was raining in the capital, Tegucigalpa, and there were
few signs of celebrations in a city where years of rampant
violence have deterred many from venturing out at night.
Hernandez, who is the head of Congress, has vowed a tough
militarized response to drug gang violence fueling the world's
highest murder rate, while Castro is seeking a shift to the left
that could revive her husband's political career.
"Juan (Hernandez) will be a good president, he's a decisive
and tenacious man and knows what to do," said Vera Molina, 53, a
housewife. "He will provide a solution for the security problems
and lack of work, I believe in him completely."
The U.S. ambassador to Honduras and the head of European
Union election observers said that the voting process was clean
and urged the participants to respect the results.
Nevertheless, Castro's party said it would not accept the
results and would take legal action against them.
CORRUPTION
Hernandez and Castro offer distinct visions for Honduras,
the biggest coffee exporter in Central America.
The economy is struggling in a country already saddled with
the world's worst annual murder rate - over 85 per 100,000
people - and how to tame gangs was a key focus of the campaign.
"I don't go out anywhere at night because here they'll kill
you for a cellphone," Antonlin Castro, 59, an electrician in
Tegucigalpa, said before voting ended. "Corruption here is
unbelievable. That's why the country is falling apart."
Five people were killed near a polling station in La
Mosquitia, in eastern Honduras, although police said the
violence was not related to the election.
Hernandez has pledged to "do whatever it takes to bring
peace and tranquility to the country," deploying the army
alongside a new military police force to tame drug gangs. That
has fanned worries of human rights abuses and corruption.
"I believe whoever gets involved in crime, should be put in
their place by the state," Hernandez said this week. "Simple."
In Congress, he oversaw a reform to allow the extradition of
Hondurans involved in organized crime to the United States, and
rolled out a militarized police force to reclaim control of a
nation of 8.5 million people where 20 are killed every day.
"Hernandez has had a lot of power, and (his) new government
will be an extension of what has come before," said Eugenio
Sosa, a political analyst and sociology professor at the
National Autonomous University of Honduras.
Nonetheless, most experts believe there is no quick fix to
the violence bred by feuds between rival gangs seeking to move
South American cocaine to the United States through Honduras.
Hernandez may also struggle to clean up a police corruption
and drive investment to a country shunned by foreign investors
and controlled by a tight-knit cabal of business elites.
Annual growth is expected to slow to around 3 percent this
year, from 3.3 percent in 2012, while the fiscal deficit is
likely to exceed 7 percent of gross domestic product.
The impact of fungus roya, or leaf rust, on large swaths of
the country's coffee crop will likely raise pressure on a
yawning current account deficit the International Monetary Fund
projects will be 11.2 percent of GDP this year.
CONSTITUTIONAL WORRY
The left-leaning Castro of the Liberty and Refoundation
Party, or LIBRE - a coalition of leftist politicians, unions and
indigenous groups founded by Zelaya - had vowed to create a
community police force and scale back the army's involvement.
She also says she would rewrite the constitution, which
risks antagonizing the business elite and those behind the
ouster of Zelaya in 2009 after he made similar overtures.
Zelaya took office in 2006 as a conservative but moved to
the left under the influence of the late Venezuelan leader Hugo
Chavez. When he explored amending the constitution, his
opponents interpreted it as a bid to seek a second term.
The Supreme Court ordered Zelaya's ouster and the army
forced him out of the country. Honduras' Congress endorsed his
removal but U.S. President Barack Obama and other foreign
leaders denounced it as a coup.
With no clear majority expected in Congress, the winner will
likely have to make concessions with rival lawmakers in a move
that should fend off a repeat coup.
More than a century of two-party control has crumbled during
the election, with LIBRE's emergence broadening the political
mainstream. A more pluralistic Honduran political landscape
should be the legacy of the vote.
(Additional reporting by Miguel Gutierrez; Editing by Kieran
Murray and Doina Chiacu)
