Presidents don't/can't win reelection in Central America

Boz and others on Twitter are recognizing the dominant Latin American trend of incumbent presidents successfully being re-elected. The last time a Latin American president lost a reelection bit was the Dominican Republic's Hipolito Mejia 2004 bid.

It's true that incumbents have tremendous advantages over their competitors (usually money, state resources, access to the media, etc.) but I'm not really sure that it is a Latin American trend rather than a South American trend. In many ways, it doesn't make sense to include Central America in the conversation since the presidents can't succeed themselves anyway, at least constitutionally speaking Mr. Ortega.

In Guatemala, presidents are allowed one term in office and those occupying the vice presidency cannot run for the next election unless the quit very early on in the presidency. As a result, the incumbent party has never been reelected. In terms of parties, the party in the presidency has an uncanny knack to find a way to become irrelevant not too long after their term in office is up, if not sooner. President Perez Molina said last month (?) that he thought the country should consider lifting the ban on presidential re-election. There are plenty of other reforms to the political system that should be implemented before this one but we'll see what the General comes up with.

In El Salvador, president can serve two non-consecutive terms. However, the only president who ran for a second term, Tony Saca, did so unsuccessfully in 2014. Francisco Flores will not be running for another term. We heard rumors that Fredy Cristiani might entertain such thoughts. I can't say that I've heard any Calderon Sol rumors to that effect. And it was only last year that we heard some conspiracy that Saca and Mauricio Funes would alternate the presidency for twenty years.

In terms of parties, the PDC collapsed following several corruption allegations, the deteriorating health and eventual death of Duarte, the party's relationship with the US and its inability to win or end the war, and with the FMLN's reinsertion into formal politics as a political party. After twenty years of ARENA rule, Salvadorans are embarking on a second five-year term for the FMLN.

The 2014 elections in Costa Rica put a nail in the coffin of the country's two-party system. While Oscar Arias won a second-term twenty years after having been elected the first time, it's not clear that any of the tainted former presidents are going to be returning to office any time soon. In terms of parties, neither the PUSC not the PLN won more than two consecutive terms.

The Liberal and National parties have alternated power in Honduras for quite some time. Some electoral changes, the 2009 coup against Zelaya, and the resistance's transformation into Libre have forever altered the country's party system. The Liberals have done well for the last three-plus decades but the party system

Nicaragua somewhat fits the incumbents never lose meme except for that all important loss for Ortega and the Sandinistas in 1990. The 2000 electoral reforms and the consolidation of state control behind Ortega means that Daniel might be in office for awhile.

Finally, Panama was all in the news earlier this month as every election story started off by mentioning that no incumbent party has held on to the presidency since the 1989 US invasion.

In Central America, most incumbents cannot run for reelection but even when we focus on political parties, incumbent parties tend not to perform very well when it comes to winning two consecutive terms.