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ARENA AND U.S. WIN IN EL SALVADOR, F.M.L.N. AND ISRAEL LOSE.

Article Excerpt
What has been called one of the most pro-US governments in the hemisphere will remain so. Tony Saca, candidate of the rightist Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (ARENA), has won El Salvador's presidential election handily over Schafik Handal, veteran communist and candidate of the Faribundo Marti para la Liberacion Nacional (FMLN). With most of the votes counted, Saca's 57.7% margin was well over the 50% needed to avoid a second-round runoff.

Schafik Handal got barely 35.6%, with the remainder split between Hector Silva, a coalition candidate (see NotiCen, 2003-09-04) for the Centro Democratico Unido (CDU) and the Partido Democrata Cristiano (PDC), and Rafael Machuca of the Partido Conciliacion Nacional (PCN).

Saca, 39, was a sportscaster and businessman who began working at a radio station when he was 13. By 22, he was nationally known and had begun buying his own stations. While very much Handal's junior, both candidates are from Usulutan and are of Palestinian descent. That may be where any similarity ends, but it may have policy implications in the new government.

No love lost

The campaign was rancorous. With support and encouragement from the pro-Saca press, the winning ARENA strategy defined Handal as a communist kidnapper who, according to reports, "would stamp out freedom, teach schoolchildren guerrilla warfare, and cause the United States to expel Salvadoran refugees."

The 73-year-old FMLN standard-bearer promised the winner that if he governed as he campaigned, "with fear and blackmail, the country is going to suffer and we will resist without pause." The FMLN controls the largest bloc in the...

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