Felipe Calderon, presidential candidate of the National Action Party (PAN) greets supporters at his party headquarters in Mexico City, July 6, 2006. (Tomas Bravo/Reuters)
Posted on 07/06/2006 12:47:14 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's conservative presidential candidate, Felipe Calderon, snatched a razor-thin election victory on Thursday, but his leftist rival vowed to fight the result in the courts and on the streets.
The Harvard-educated Calderon had an insurmountable lead with 35.87 percent of the vote and only a few dozen polling stations pending. Mexico's Federal Electoral Institute said it would declare the winner on the basis of these overall results.
Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, a combative left-wing former Mexico City mayor, was 0.57 points behind Calderon and angrily claimed the vote was plagued with irregularities.
He pledged to fight it in Mexico's electoral tribunal and called a rally of supporters in Mexico City's vast central square for Saturday, raising fears of street protests and further unrest as well as weeks of legal wrangling like that which followed the U.S. election in 2000.
"We cannot recognize or accept these results," he said.
A relaxed Calderon led supporters in a noisy party at his ruling National Action Party's offices and immediately called on his adversaries to forget an ugly and fiercely contested election that has plunged Mexico into a political crisis.
"If the contest is behind us, our differences are behind us. Now is the hour for unity and agreements between Mexicans," said Calderon, a pro-U.S. former energy minister.
Calderon, 43, would be an ally of the United States in Latin America, where leftists have taken power in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Uruguay and Venezuela and turned away from Washington.
At home, Calderon promises to clamp down on violent criminals and powerful drug trafficking gangs as well as create millions of jobs with pro-business reforms, more foreign investment and a boom in construction.
He was the clear favorite of investors and Mexico's financial markets jumped on news of his victory. The stock market was up 2.5 percent in afternoon trade and the peso currency gained 1.6 percent.
In Mexico City's Pensil neighborhood, a working-class warren of dilapidated tenements and greasy car repair shops that staunchly backs Lopez Obrador, the mood was somber.
"ROBIN HOOD"
Angry supporters gathered in doorways and on street corners raging against the electoral institute and Calderon's party. One bewildered group thronged around a newspaper stand, staring incredulously at front page pictures of a jubilant Calderon.
"It's as if somebody stole your child," said taco-seller Beatriz Montoy, vowing to attend Saturday's rally to support the man she referred to as her "Robin Hood."
"We're not going to let them do this," she said. "There is going to be an avalanche of people."
Lopez Obrador had led the recount for hours but Calderon overtook him in the early hours of Thursday as the last votes came in from his strongholds in northern and western Mexico.
Hundreds of supporters, many of them young professionals dressed in suits or fashionable jeans, packed into Calderon's party offices to toast his win with champagne and tequila.
The narrow victory margin and months of animosity between left and right have many fearing weeks of legal battles and massive street protests ahead.
"If a revolution is needed, a revolution there will be," said Guadalupe Tellez, a 53-year-old Lopez Obrador supporter who wept outside the leftist's modest Mexico City apartment. "He is the only person who wanted to help the people."
Lopez Obrador was the red-hot favorite for most of the campaign, but Calderon closed the gap by painting his rival as a danger to Mexico's economic stability and linking him to anti-U.S. firebrand Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
When Calderon was judged to have won a preliminary count earlier this week, Lopez Obrador cried foul and protests broke out in the capital.
Lopez Obrador pledged to help Mexico's poor with welfare benefits and ambitious infrastructure projects to create jobs.
He won wide support in Mexico City but his spending policies worried investors, business leaders and many middle-class families. He also failed to make major inroads in traditionally conservative northern Mexico.
(Additional reporting by Frank Jack Daniel and Greg Brosnan)
Felipe Calderon, presidential candidate of the National Action Party (PAN) greets supporters at his party headquarters in Mexico City, July 6, 2006. (Tomas Bravo/Reuters)
Yes, they have learned well from American politics.
A supporter of presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador of the Revolutionary Democratic Party (PRD) cries in front of the PRD's campaign headquarters in view of adverse election results in Mexico City, of Thursday, July 6, 2006. (AP Photo/Victor R. Caivano)
Not for long... At least, not if the Jimmy Carters of the world have anything to do with it.
I expect the recount to continue until the Leftist candidate walks away with the victory.
Okay, so I'm somewhat cynical. I hope this guy retains the victory.
Preliminary results in Mexico's presidential elections.(AFP)
Crockett and Tubbs are so going to be on his trail...
Do expatriated Mexicans (i.e. our illegal aliens) vote in this?
Thanks for the map.
Muy Bueno Jalisco!
What amazes me is PRI's incredible decline in their share of the Presidential vote.
I believe it indicates that a great many far-Left PRI supporters would not vote for Roberto Madrazo. I'm not sure what those reasons were - but it allowed a split in the Left that enabled Calderon to slip by.
Do expatriated Mexicans (i.e. our illegal aliens) vote in this?
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I am not sure how many actually voted, some reports said not nearly as many voted as either hoped for were anticipated to. One reason, enhanced border watch activities.
It's the limes vs. the papaya states, color scheme wise. ;-)
Any analysis of why most of the light green is closest to the United States?
(Trying to come up to speed on this...)
Where does Fox fit into this? outgoing?
Amazing, that after gunning down Tubbs brother in New York, Calderon has risen to the top in Mexico.
Still love that pilot episode....
Thank goodness!! I'm especially happy that President Bush will not have to deal with Lopez Obrador.
In December , Fox moves on.. Calderon moves in.
Doesn't look good with a fairly well-defined geographic line between result preferences, and a revolutionary attitude from the loser.
My gut read is that the farther south you go, the more anti-establishment the populace is, ie; not supportive of a continuation of the current policies.
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