Leftist Demands Full Recount In Mexico

MEXICO CITY – Mexico’s leftist party demanded Tuesday that electoral officials recount every vote cast in the country’s closest presidential race ever, claiming the balloting was manipulated and renewing fears that its fiery candidate will launch massive street protests if he doesn’t get his way.

The campaign manager for Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador made the announcement in a statement read to reporters, laying the foundation for weeks of political uncertainty.

Lopez Obrador’s supporters claim the preliminary vote count showing business-friendly rival Felipe Calderon with an advantage of about 400,000 votes was manipulated. Lopez Obrador’s party had initially requested a manual count only in certain instances, but was now demanding a full review.

The Federal Electoral Institute begins on Wednesday an official count, in which it reviews polling places’ reports, but doesn’t count each vote.

Tensions were rising Tuesday in southern Oaxaca state, where striking teachers occupied businesses, boarded buses and blocked roads despite pledges that they would halt their sometimes violent campaign until the presidency had been decided.

Financial markets and the peso rallied for a second day on the apparent win by the fiscally conservative former energy secretary. Calderon told Radio Formula that “the people are right, the markets are right” in assuming he has won.

Mexico must now focus on the future, he said in an interview with Radio Formula. “The problems are big, but Mexico is bigger than its problems,” he said. There were some fears that Lopez Obrador’s refusal to accept Calderon’s apparent victory could throw the country into turmoil.

Allegations of irregularities threaten to drag out the process for weeks, if not months, putting Mexico’s young democracy to the test. “There are about 3 million votes missing,” Lopez Obrador told reporters at his campaign headquarters Monday night.

The former Mexico City mayor explained that officials had estimated a voter turnout of about 41 million or 42 million, yet preliminary vote tallies by Mexico’s Federal Electoral Institute only showed about 38 million ballots cast.

As a result, the institute’s first count is something that “we cannot accept,” he said. Members of Lopez Obrador’s Democratic Revolution Party said there were indications that the preliminary count may have been manipulated to favor Calderon’s National Action Party, the party of President Vicente Fox ”

The Federal Electoral Institute did not respond to the allegation. For decades, Mexico’s elections were rigged to ensure the ruling party’s victory – fraud that allegedly included the 1988 presidential count in which a computer crash was blamed for a stunning turnaround that ensured another six years in power for the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI.

After Sunday night’s rapid vote-sampling, both candidates immediately declared victory. Representatives of PRI candidate Roberto Madrazo conceded Monday night.

Lopez Obrador continued to claim victory, saying, “we have a commitment to the citizens to defend the will of millions of Mexicans.” “We are going to employ whatever legal means,” he told supporters. He claimed there were “many irregularities” in the election, including badly reported results and the double counting of votes.

He also asked how it was possible that his party won 155 of 300 electoral districts without winning the presidency.

In an interview Tuesday with the Televisa network, Luis Carlos Ugalde, president of the autonomous Federal Electoral Institute, said officials would review any problems during the official count.

With 98.45 percent of polling stations reporting, Calderon had 36.38 percent and Lopez Obrador had 35.34 percent.

Madrazo was a distant third with 21.57 percent, and minor candidates and write-ins accounted for the rest.

By MARK STEVENSON, Associated Press Writer