Presidential Tally - Arias Leads (led) by 12,598
Although the TSE claims it is inaccurate to do so, Oscar Arias unofficially leads the voting by over 15,000 after the 712 polling stations that were not included in Monday’s final preliminary tally have been counted by hand. Arias received a total of 70,681 votes while 58,083 were for Solís. The tally represents 11,56 % of the total.
According to PLN officialis, adding the 12,598 votes in the manual tally to the 3,250 vote advantage that Arias had in the electronically reported votes gives Arias a clear advantage of 15,626 votes.
However, the TSE maintained that the race was too close to call and that the manual counting is a seperate process from the electronic reporting. "You can’t compare apples to oranges", said Luis Antonio Sobrado, a TSE judge. " The TSE cannot, nor should it, make official any electoral victory in the presidential race. Until the manual scrutiny is complete. "
Both candidates continued to call for patience and emphasized respect for the TSE and their willingness to wait for the official results. Some campaign like sniping did occur though, related to Arias’ remarks of yesterday.
"To say now that we have won is untrue. I am enthusiastic, because the TSE gave us a solid majority. But they said to wait until the last vote is counted, and they are correct. It would be very presumptous of either candidate to say that we have won, it is not true"
Meanwhile, Ottón Solís said he would not refer to the PLN calculations. "In developed countries, a candidate does not pressure another to recognize or not a defeat, nor do they pressure the entity in charge of the elections to declare a winner. The important thing is that the count is correct and I am optomistic about the results. "