Big Lizards:Blog:Entry “Felipe Calderón Wins”

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July 6, 2006

Felipe Calderón Wins

Hatched by Dafydd

As Big Lizards first predicted in Teleblogging 2: I Think Calderón Has Won..., conservative Felipe Calderón of the National Action Party (PAN) of Vicente Fox has been officially declared the winner of the Mexican election:

The ruling party's Felipe Calderon won the official count in Mexico's disputed presidential race Thursday, a come-from-behind victory for the stiff technocrat. But his leftist rival refused to concede and said he'd fight the results in court.... [Why do I have this curious sense of déjà vu? -- the Mgt.]

With the 41 million votes counted, Calderon of President Vicente Fox's National Action Party had 35.88 percent, or 14,981,268 votes, to 14,745,262, or 35.31 percent, for Lopez Obrador of the Democratic Revolution Party. The two were separated by 0.57 percent, or 236,006 votes.

This is, of course, nearly identical to the unofficial, preliminary tally of Sunday, which ended with Calderón ahead by 0.6%. In this age of computerized ballot counting, recounts usually are.

And right on cue, Andrés Manuel López Obrador of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) is calling out his supporters for an "informational" protest -- which I still predict will turn into violent street battles, as Big Lizards suggested. From the AP story linked above:

On Thursday, the former Mexico City mayor said that widespread fraud - not campaign missteps - cost him the election, and he called on his supporters to gather Saturday for an "informational assembly."

"We are always going to act in a responsible manner, but at the same time, we have to defend the citizens' will," he said.

He denounced election officials for going forward with an official count of poll-workers' vote tallies, as required by election law, and ignoring his demand for a ballot-by-ballot review.

"We are going to the Federal Electoral Tribunal with the same demand - that the votes be counted - because we cannot accept these results," Lopez Obrador said.

So keep a weather eye to the south, but don't let López Obrador cause you to lose sight of the fact that, regardless of "the citizens' will," the voters willed that Felipe Calderón should be the new president of Mexico.

Hatched by Dafydd on this day, July 6, 2006, at the time of 4:40 PM

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» Mexico Headed for Civil War? from Big Lizards
(And if they are -- think of the refugees!) This AP story builds upon the increasingly violent antics and agitation of losing leftist presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador, of the "Democratic" Revolution Party (not enough Democratic, too... [Read More]

Tracked on September 1, 2006 10:08 PM