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Suppose Candidate 1 was declared the winner of the election to be the leader of the country. However, after he/she takes office, the results changed due to (maybe) a recount, court case, etc.

So, Candidate 2 actually won. Has this ever happened and what happened after that?

Note: It can be from any country, but the election needs to be of the leader of the country (President, Prime Ministers, etc.)

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    I've voted to close this question because it is too broad. The corrective actions for the wrong person being sworn into offer would likely differ drastically between countries.
    – Drunk Cynic
    Dec 9, 2016 at 8:30
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    I'm actually asking about the corrective actions for that particular incident ("what happened after that"), not the general corrective actions. I'm not sure if the question in general might be too broad.
    – Panda
    Dec 9, 2016 at 9:27
  • You may want to look at the 2008-9 Honduran Constitutional Crisis, although it's not spot on, it's close. The Reichstag fire removed much of the Nazi party's opposition in the German parliament at the time, the communists, very much extra-judiciously after passage of an emergency decress
    – user9790
    Dec 9, 2016 at 12:15
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    Prime ministers generally aren't elected directly by the populace. Instead, they are selected by the legislature, much as the Speaker of the House is selected by Representatives in the US. In countries with a prime minister and without a president, it's not clear what would count as the "election...of the leader of the country". The people vote for the legislature and then the legislature selects a prime minister in a public, easily counted vote.
    – Brythan
    Dec 9, 2016 at 13:51
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    nytimes.com/1994/02/19/us/…
    – abelenky
    Dec 10, 2016 at 21:37

1 Answer 1

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It has happenned a lot, even recently. What happens afterwards is usually not desirable, especially in the case of recount and fraud, or premature victory announcements, since legitimity is then hard to establish.

A very famous example is the 2000 US elecion:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2000_United_States_presidential_election_recount_in_Florida

The loser (George W. Bush) got the office anyway.

Ivory Coast election, 2010 : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ivorian_presidential_election,_2010

Gabonese election 2016 : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabonese_presidential_election,_2016

Note that for recent elections, the person who wrote the wikipedia article (as well as many others) may be partisan.

Rq : This list is not exhaustive, only the examples I read about in the press

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    -1. Your personal opinion is contrary to every single expert. GWB won Florida - and would have won even if SCOTUS authorized the recount. You might want to read the Wiki article you linked to, it's spelled there in black and white. "Gore request for recounts of all ballots in Broward, Miami-Dade, Palm Beach, and Volusia counties Bush by 225". "After the election, recounts conducted by various United States news media organizations indicated that Bush would have won if certain recounting methods had been used (including the one favored by Gore at the time of the Supreme Court decision)"
    – user4012
    Dec 10, 2016 at 21:50
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    @user4012 I am not american, have never been to america, do not plan to, and have no personal opinion. You might want to read the article fully too, the line you pointed is one under "Review of limited sets of ballots", while the category "Review of all ballots statewide" points to Al-gore. Besides, the table quoted is only from one study
    – user5751924
    Dec 10, 2016 at 22:01
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    the argument over that election was that Gore would have won had Supreme Court allowed his recount. Except as you can see if you check details, recount Gore requested would have still marked Bush as won. Yes, you can come up with artificial recount methodologies that would make Gore win - but in 2000, NONE of them were proposed by Gore.
    – user4012
    Dec 10, 2016 at 22:16
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    Of the 3 examples quoted, I think the Florida and Gabonese examples don't match the criteria of the question. All the controversy in Florida was resolved BEFORE Bush took office, not after. In the Gabonese example, according to Wikipedia, there does not seem to be a clear cut decision that overturned the initially reported winner, so much as ungoing unhappiness and suspicion
    – Jonno
    Jan 9, 2017 at 19:57

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