Ana Mitila Lora writes today in the Listin Diario that Leonel Fernandez won the election with a new record number of votes cast, with 2,063,871 Dominicans having voted for him on Sunday. President Hipolito Mejia had been elected with the previous record number of voters, 1,589,419 in the 2000 election.
Lora comments that Juan Bosch, running on the PRD ticket in 1962, in the first democratic election after the toppling of the Trujillo regime, won that year with 60% of the vote, or 628,044 of a total 1 million votes cast. His closest contender was the UCN party candidate who received 30%.
Lora theorizes that a large number of the votes cast in favor of Fernandez were ?borrowed,? won merely as a vote against another. ?This means that Fernandez and his team will have to work hard to satisfy, if only partially, the expectations of the voters who have learned to reward or punish the President for the performance of the economy.? She comments that the fact that Mejia obtained 33% of the vote in the worst economic crisis this country has confronted in recent memory is a feat in itself, and a demonstration of the loyalty of the PRD voters to their party.
She says furthermore that in the midst of the present post-electoral euphoria, it appears many citizens have discovered the power of the vote and are already alerting the legislators: ?If you do not conduct yourselves appropriately, we will oust you from Congress also.?
Year PRD PLD PRSC 1978 855,665 18,375 698,163 1982 854,868 179,849 669,176 1986 706,588 387,881 855,565
1990 444,086 647,625 653,278 1994 1,188,394 395,653 1,263,341 1996 1,394,641 1,466,382 435,504
2000 1,589,419 795,182 784,518
2004 1,215,928 2,063,871 312,493