Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Leftist candidate rejects Mexico results as 'fraudulent'

Mexico City, Jul 3 : The runner-up in Mexico's presidential election has rejected Enrique Pena Nieto's "fraudulent" victory, raising the specter of protests that rocked Mexico City when he lost six years ago.
    When Leftist candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador lost the 2006 presidential election by less than one per cent he claimed fraud and organised mass protests that paralysed Mexico City for more than a month.
    The first official results from Sunday's vote showed Lopez Obrad or with 31 per cent of the vote against 38 per cent for Pena Nieto of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) – a much wider margin than six years ago.
    "We cannot accept a fraudulent result, nobody can accept that," Lopez Obrador, of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) said at a press conference, decrying Sunday's vote as a "filthy ... national embarrassment."
    The PRI was synonymous with the Mexican state as it governed for seven decades until 2000 using a mixture of pervasive patronage, selective repression, rigged elections and widespread bribery.
    Lopez Obrador claimed the PRI, through its national party and governors, spent millions of pesos buying votes. He also charged that the news media heavily favoured the PRI and that the party shattered campaign spending limits.
    "We will provide evidence for these claims and will file appropriate legal action," said Lopez Obrador, emphasizing that he and his supporters will first scrutinize the balloting results with election officials.
    He was coy about whether he would call for protests like in 2006, saying: "We're going to wait
AFP

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