MEXICO: Mexico's president-elect Felipe Calderon celebrates confirmation of his victory by an electoral court

Mexican leftists participated in a rally in downtown Mexico City on Sunday (September 10) in support of their losing presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who attended the event. During a speech, Lopez Obrador announced that his supporters will relax a huge sit-in protest in the centre of the capital to allow an army parade, and continued his accusations of vote fraud during recent presidential elections. "We didn't trigger the political crisis our country is enduring. The crisis was triggered by those who committed fraud, refuse to be transparent and violate the constitution and step all over our people's dignity," Lopez Obrador said. Supporters of leftist Lopez Obrador have paralised downtown Mexico City for weeks, camping in the main streets to protest his narrow loss in the July 2 presidential election to conservative Felipe Calderon. The sit-ins have been peaceful but a traditional military parade through the city center on Mexico's Sept. 16 independence day was seen as a possible flashpoint between leftists and troops. Lopez Obrador, who promised to lift Mexico's poor out of misery, told his supporters to suspend their protests to let the army hold the parade of military hardware, which takes place every year in central streets and the Zocalo square. The left accuses President Vicente Fox of being part of a fraud that let ruling party candidate Calderon win the election by only 234,000 votes out of 41 million. Felipe Calderon celebrated in a massive rally in Mexico City's bull-fighting arena the veredict by an electoral court who named him Mexico's president-elect last week, throwing out Lopez Obrador's claims of widespread vote rigging. The judges' ruling cannot be appealed and the conservative will take office on Dec. 1. "I must govern without distinction of political party or candidate for which the people may have voted, without distinction of which religion each Mexican professes. I will govern defending each person's ideology and without distinction of social status," said Calderon during the rally speech. Lopez Obrador has said he will form a so-called parallel government to resist Calderon's rule.

ITN Source | September 12, 2006

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