 Under heavy pressure from Washington, López Gutiérrez allowed an unusually open campaign and election.The long-fragmented conservatives reunited as the National Party of Honduras (Partido Nacional de Honduras—PNH), which ran as its candidate General Tiburcio Carías Andino, the governor of the department of Cortés.The liberal PLH was unable to unite around a single candidate and split into two dissident groups, one supporting former president Policarpo Bonilla, the other advancing the candidacy of Juan Angel Arias.