Last day of the campaign

Today is the last day El Salvador's political parties are permitted to campaign prior to the presidential election on Sunday.

Greg from the SHARE Foundation, sent me this note:

As the SHARE Foundation prepares to guide International Observers, mostly from all over the United States, the propaganda has taken over the streets of San Salvador. Just from my first few days back in the country since 2007, there have been more electricity poles splashed with FMLN red and white masking the blue of ARENA. This technique actually making it pink and white, which is just more symbolism of the desperate campaigning techniques of both sides. There are no laws or boundaries of respect for campaign materials. ARENA clearly has more money for campaigning in San Salvador taking more space than the FMLN on the radio.

The anxiety and energy are felt everywhere, either in the grocery story or a pupuseria. There are multiple stories in Diario de Hoy or Prensa Graffica trying to smear the FMLN campaign. It is fairly obvious which party has been in control for the last 20 years. Every Salvadoran has a strong opinion of the election from the taxi driver to the woman making a pupusa. Political marches wake you up in the morning and by the afternoon you have seen 10 trucks with political paraphernalia all over them.

It is five days from the election and it seems like campaigning will not lighten up. It will be interesting to see what the final campaign attempts will be.

You can see photos of FMLN activists putting up campaign ads at Adam Kufeld's website El Salvador Elections 2009. (Check the March 6 photo gallery). Adam is the photographer behind the book El Salvador which features his photography from the country during the 1980s. He is photo and video blogging this week to cover the elections.

Comments

qc.carlos said…
Hi there, these are videos I posted in Youtube about the elections in El Salvador. I hope you can view them and send them to your contacts.

Hola, estos son videos que he publicado en Youtube acerca de las elecciones en El Salvador, espero que puedas verlos y difundirlos con tus contactos:


Congresista de EEUU pide respeto a elecciones de El Salvador

Salvadoreños piden apoyo de Obama y Congreso de EEUU

Obama escucha! apoya elecciones libres en El Salvador

Salvadoran Americans ask Obama to support free elections

Salvadoran Americans request US support for free elections

Juan Romagoza apoya al FMLN


.
Anonymous said…
living in San Salvador my whole life this phenomenon isn't a scoop, as a matter of fact, years before were worst, watching ARENA propaganda ONLY, because as written in your article ARENA's monetary resource is higher than FMLN, election intencity is getting tight day by day and hopefully on Monday morning El Salvador will have a new president
for the well change of our nation!
Anonymous said…
While I personally think that every Salvadorian has the right to be free at electing their candidate of choice, there is some fear among some Salvadorians that the FMLN hidden motives might lead to a revolution different from what most of us would like to have. Nor do I like ARENA, but sure scares the hell out of me what the FMLN motives are. If the party is going to replace the currently democratic party, if we really have one, it is going to have to assure those republicans who fear the worst in this case an assurance that Funes will only run what is currently written in the constitution of El Salvador and will not try to change the political sphere to the level where people especially business minded one's will feel that they will have to give up everything they worked hard for. If you can keep republicans and people with democratic minded ideals intact then kudos to Funes. If I recall Funes promised he will only run for what the constitution indicated on the interview with Jorge and I also remember what Chavez said "if not sooner" he said. Conclusion he Lied. Lets hope this does not repeat itself or we are in a heap of trouble.
Anonymous said…
So what does this mean for El Salvador? I'm happy they elected a socialist, but Ortega in Nicaraugua has turned out to be a Catholic extremist. Is Fune so inclined? I hope he is more liberal. Anyone, anytime the right wing losed an election is a day for hope. --- Nick