With 80 percent of votes counted, centrist candidate widens lead over his Trump-backed conservative rival.

Honduran presidential candidate Salvador Nasralla has widened a narrow lead over his conservative rival, Nasry Asfura, who is backed by United States President Donald Trump, as the counting of votes continued for a fourth day.

With 80.29 percent of ballots tallied on Wednesday, the centrist Liberal Party’s Nasralla held 40.23 percent while the National Party’s Asfura had 39.69 percent, according to the country’s National Electoral Council (CNE).

Nasrallah’s lead over Asfura was less than 14,000 votes.

Rixi Moncada of the ruling leftist LIBRE Party was well behind in third place with 19.01 percent.

The result was still too early to call, according to the CNE.

The Honduran presidency is decided in a single round, and the candidate with the most votes wins, even if the margin is narrow or they fall short of an absolute majority.

The election on Sunday was fiercely contested, and the counting of votes has been delayed by technical difficulties.

The CNE on Wednesday suspended vote counting for a second time, with members of the electoral council blaming the company behind the tabulating platform for the outages.

CNE official Cossette Lopez-Osorio said the latest counting halt was due to system maintenance that was done without proper notice, and added that she considered it “inexcusable”.

Nasralla, a 72-year-old television presenter, remained confident despite the problems.

“Either way, we’re going to win,” he wrote on X.

Election observers from the European Union and the Organization of American States, as well as Honduras’s electoral authority, have called for calm and patience as the final votes are counted.

Ballots are still arriving from remote areas, some of which are only accessible by donkey or river boats, according to the CNE, and the declaration of a winner may still be days away.

Early preliminary results released on Monday had originally shown Asfura with a slim lead of some 500 votes. Election organisers declared a “technical tie” and said votes would have to be counted by hand.

When the count was updated on Tuesday, Nasralla had swung to a narrow lead.

Trump on Monday alleged election fraud, without providing evidence, saying on his Truth Social account that Honduras was “trying to change the results of their Presidential Election”.

“If they do there will be hell to pay! The people of Honduras voted in overwhelming numbers on November 30th,” he said. Trump has threatened to stop US aid to Honduras if Asfura does not win. In 2024, the US provided $193.5m in aid to the Central American country.

The CNE legally has one month to announce a winner.

Moncada, the ruling party candidate, told the Telesur television news network on Wednesday that the vote transmission system was flawed and criticised it as lacking transparency.

Referring to Trump’s accusations of fraud, which she said violated international protocols, Moncada said this marked “a direct intervention that affects the interests of the Honduran people”.

Trump has also granted a pardon to Juan Orlando Hernandez, a former president from Asfura’s National Party who had been serving a 45-year sentence in the US for drug trafficking.

The 57-year-old lawyer was released on Monday in what was widely perceived as more interference.

In his first social media post since being released, Hernandez on Wednesday thanked Trump, saying he “changed my life”.

Earlier, in a four-page letter to the US president published by the media on Wednesday, Hernandez said: “Just as you, President Trump, I have suffered political persecution.”

Hernandez’s wife, Ana Garcia, told the AFP news agency he would not be returning home immediately due to security fears.