Mexico's Electoral Tribunal Will Decide Tomorrow Whether to Recount Votes (Translation)

La Crónica de Hoy ^ | August 4, 2006 | Notimex ( translated by self )

[StJacques]

The TEPJF Decides Tomorrow if There Will Be a Recount of Votes

The Superior Court of the Electoral Tribunal of the Judicial Power of the Federation (TEPJF) will convene¹ a public session at 10:00 a.m. this Saturday, to resolve 175 received incident reports and will make a special pronouncement with reference to the challenges to the presidential election.

The seven magistrates who make up the Superior Court should pronounce their decision with respect to the electoral packets² to determine whether or not it will carry out a recount of votes of the presidential election of July 2.

At 10:15 a.m. this Friday the announcement was put up on the dockets of the TEPJF relative to the public session which has the object of resolving the 175 incidents with respect to an equal number of suits of [electoral] inconformity filed by the For the Good of All coalition.³

The list of proceedings includes JIN212, known as the "Mother of All Appeals" or the "Leading Appeal," filed by the For the Good of All coalition to challenge the validity of the presidential election and demanding a vote by vote recount in the 300 electoral districts of the country.

With reference to the aforementioned it is anticipated that Saturday morning the Superior Court will definitively pronounce itself with respect to the recount.

Among the [possible] scenarios are that the magistrates may incline themselves not to open any electoral packets; that they pronounce the opening of a specific number in 173 electoral districts, or they also could decide to proceed to the opening of all the electoral packets in the 300 electoral districts of the country.

The notice of the public session in the dockets is shaped by a total of 14 sheets of paper in which it makes clear the identifying number of each one of the proceedings that will be the object of analysis and legal opinion with relation to the incident report and the special Saturday pronouncement.

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Translator's Notes:

¹Sic, a grammatical error in original article, which uses the Preterite (past) Tense referring to a meeting that will take place tomorrow.

²The "electoral packets" are the crated and sealed paper ballots, which are also referred to as the casillas, a name that can alternatively be used to describe the precincts in which votes were cast.

³The "For the Good of All coalition" (La Coalición Por el Bien de Todos) represents an alliance of Lopez Obrador's PRD (Party of the Democratic Revolution), the PT (Labor Party), and Convergencia (Convergence for Democracy) in support of Lopez Obrador's presidential candidacy.

[StJacques]

Tomorrow will be the moment the entire post-election controversy in Mexico has been building up to, since we will all know whether there will be any recount of the individual ballots, which Lopez Obrador has been calling for from the very beginning. It is impossible for me to predict what the Tribunal's decision will be, but I'm going to guess that they are going to order a partial recount either of the entirety of the 173 electoral districts in which Lopez Obrador's challenges have been specifically targeted or, more likely in my opinion, certain precincts within those districts where either Lopez Obrador's campaign was not represented by on-site precinct commissioners or in which certain fundamental errors of counting or reporting have been shown to be credible. I have a very difficult time believing that the Tribunal will decide for a complete recount of all the ballots and I think it only slightly unlikely they will order a recount of none of them. But again; I am guessing here, it really is impossible for me to know.

There is other news from the past of couple of days that I could post at greater length with sources, but let me just sum it all up to make three main points: the PRI party has united with Calderon's PAN party to oppose the shutdown of central Mexico City by Lopez Obrador's followers and they may even remove the pro-AMLO Governor of the Federal District of Mexico City if he continues to support this shutdown; there has been an ongoing desertion of Lopez Obrador's cause from several areas, including one major union (the CROC) and numerous leftist spokesmen and ideologues, among them the famed Mexican novelist Carlos Fuentes, all of whom are critical of the damage done to bystanders by the shutdown of central Mexico City this week; and finally, numerous experts and intellectuals have been coming forth to refute the charge that there was widespread fraud in the July 2 election, including some of Lopez Obrador's own supporters. There was a circular letter signed by 135 such individuals, most of whom are in academia, the media, public relations, or otherwise known as prominent authors.

To sum everything up, I believe AMLO has gone a little too far in his decision to apply real pressure on the Electoral Tribunal to rule his way and I am expecting that process will continue. We'll see.

[StJacques]

A Mexican post-election ping for you all.

Anyone wishing to view other translated articles on this controversy may use the forum's keyword search option with the unique keyword -- STJTRANSLATION

[BunnySlippers]

Any guesses as to what they will decide?

I'll say that they will decline the recount ... but, really, anything could happen.

[StJacques]

Hello BunnySlippers.

My best guess is a partial recount within the 173 electoral districts AMLO addressed in his official challenge to the election. And I don't expect a full recount of each of those districts either, just of those precincts where problems may exist.

Remember this is just a guess and I'm pretty sure that Mexican courts are just like American courts, they can surprise you.

[redgolum]

So this is still going on? What does the Mexican public think of it?

[StJacques]

"What does the Mexican public think of it?"

Mexican public opinion stayed pretty much the same as it was right after the election, with only a slight decrease in support for Lopez Obrador's cause, until last weekend when he and his followers virtually shut down the center of Mexico City, under the protection of the Federal District Governor who is a Lopez Obrador supporter, which for all practical purposes brought the downtown business district to a halt. Since then support for AMLO has been slipping dramatically. He's about to go down in flames in my opinion.

[Texan5]

I hope you're right-he shouldn't have taken a page from Al Gore's playbook.

I have a cousin who works for an American hotel chain in Guadalajara and lives there, and also 2 cousins who work for American companies and live in Torreon. They have told me in e-mail that it is quiet where they are, but they are worried about all this, and thinking of asking the companies they work for to transfer them back to Texas. They are concerned that Obregon's people will try to target Americans who are obviously of Mexican ancestry and American companies in some way.

[StJacques]

Lopez Obrador's people haven't crossed the line to violence yet, and AMLO himself fears it because he knows it will split his party and his coalition between those favoring radical change through peaceful means and those willing to use violence outright. And it's impossible for me to tell whether it will happen one way or another. But I will say this; once the genie gets out of the bottle, there will be no putting him back.

And as a side comment, I don't think your friends and relatives are in any danger where they are right now. But they should stay away from the center of Mexico and its southern areas if this thing comes undone.

[Political Junkie Too]

Any guesses as to what they will decide?

Maybe they'll decide that Landis can keep his trophy.

Oops... wrong country.

-PJ

[StJacques]

LOL! We're gonna recount testosterone levels now.

[Political Junkie Too]

Plus, they have to separate out the "provisional" synthetic ones, too.

-PJ

[kesg]

I agree. No recount.

[StJacques]

I agree as well kesg. But I don't fear one either.

[kidd]

Significance of a Saturday decision:

No recount.

People will not be at work. An anticipated uprising by the moonbats clogging the streets of Mexico City will only have a minimal impact on business. Most citizens will be at home, thus simplifying police control of a possible ugly situation.

[kidd]

Also (kind of another indicator) - thunderstorms predicted for Mexico City tommorrow.

[AmericaUnited]

Most excellent summary appraisel + news. Thanks.

[AmericaUnited]

thunderstorms predicted for Mexico City tommorrow.

With as superstitious as most of these supporters probably are, imagine if a giant lightening strike zaps a few dead?

[StJacques]

"Significance of a Saturday decision . . . People will not be at work. An anticipated uprising . . . will only have a minimal impact . . . thus simplifying police control . . ."

You know, I never even thought about this kidd, but now that I ponder your theory, I think I agree. They are definitely not going to order a full recount.

You should go to tradespot.com and wager on politics kidd. I think you might do well.

[SAJ]

Saint --

As of a few minutes ago, ObraGore was 4.3 bid @ 5.5, 2 up.

This translates to: the punters are yawning about the recount.

[StJacques]

SAJ, just as soon as I put up that last post I thought to myself, "I should've pinged SAJ there."

I'm glad to see you didn't miss it.