Lopez Obrador backers slow Mexico City
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Lopez Obrador backers slow Mexico City
Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit
AP via Yahoo - Jul 31, 2006
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060731/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/mexico_elections_12
Lopez Obrador backers slow Mexico City
By MARK STEVENSON
Associated Press Writer
MEXICO CITY - Supporters of Mexico's leftist presidential candidate brought
rush-hour traffic to a crawl Monday, causing the stock market to drop and
forcing office workers dressed in business suits and high heels to hike for
miles to work.
The sprawling tent cities in the financial heart of the Mexican capital
were another sign that Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and his supporters won't
accept anything less than victory from the top electoral court.
The tribunal is weighing allegations that fraud gave ruling party candidate
Felipe Calderon a slight advantage in the July 2 election. It has until
Sept. 6 to declare a president-elect or annul the elections.
Lopez Obrador is demanding a vote-for-vote recount, and has vowed to block
the city center until the Federal Electoral Tribunal rules on his request.
Meanwhile, Mexican stocks closed 0.8 percent lower, in part because the
protests made investors nervous.
"We'll stay here for as long as it takes, but we're not going to let them
impose a president on us," said farmer Anacleto Garcia Martinez, 53, as he
warmed his coffee on a wood-burning brazier set up beneath a tarp strung
from the wrought-iron gate leading to Chapultepec Park.
With his broad mustache and a blanket hung over his shoulders, he resembled
his ancestors, farmers-turned-soldiers in Mexico's 1910 revolution.
"We've got revolutionary blood," said fellow farmer Angel Campirano, 49, of
the city's rural Milpa Alta district. "Farmers are being forced to sell off
their land, and we are defending the land."
But modern Mexico -- which now depends more on commerce, services and
manufacturing than on agriculture -- has little patience with such
sentiments.
Salesman Alejandro Lara, 33, walked two miles up Mexico City's swank
Reforma Avenue, blocked by protesters, before he began shouting.
"I'm either going to have to get up at 5 a.m. every day, or ask for
vacations," Lara said angrily. "It's too bad, because I supported Lopez
Obrador. But now, after this, I wouldn't want to have him governing us. He
scares me."
Lara was among hundreds of office workers who passed protesters blaring
salsa music and playing soccer in streets blocked by barrels, scrap wood,
ropes and lawn chairs.
Cesar Nava, a spokesman for Calderon, called on Mayor Alejandro Encinas to
reopen the streets to traffic, contending Lopez Obrador's leftist
Democratic Revolution Party -- of which Encinas is a member -- had
'kidnapped' the city.
"What they're doing is kidnapping Mexico City," Nava told reporters. "We
see that as an unacceptable, partisan act and absolutely contemptuous of
democracy."
"The mayor up to now has been an accomplice to the flagrant breaking of the
law. We hope he changes his behavior and starts acting like a mayor," Nava
said.
In Washington, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack expressed
confidence Mexican authorities would resolve the dispute.
"They have declared a winner. There are provisions for appeals. We have
full confidence in the ability of these Mexican institutions to deal with
this kind of situation," McCormack said.
There was no estimate of the economic damage from the protest. Some
businesses were closed, and a few tourists could be seen struggling with
their luggage on blockaded streets.
Marches and protest camps are common in Mexico City, a megalopolis of 20
million people, but Sunday's rally and resulting tent cities were on a
scale that hasn't been seen in recent Mexican history.
Democratic Revolution spokesman Gerardo Fernandez defended the protests,
saying: "They are absolutely peaceful and absolutely legal. We are not
violating anyone's rights."
Encinas said Monday his government wouldn't forcibly remove the protesters.
President Vicente Fox's spokesman, Ruben Aguilar, said federal authorities
also won't step in, unless the city requests their help.
"The organizers of these demonstrations and marches have said they will be
peaceful and respect the rights of others," Aguilar said. "We hope they
keep their word."
Lopez Obrador is known for his ability to mobilize millions. Last year, he
led marches that successfully blocked an attempt to impeach him as Mexico
City mayor, a move that would have kept him from running for president.
Calderon, who has an advantage of about 240,000 votes, or 0.6 percent of
the official count, argues the election was fair and has condemned the
street protests as "senseless."
"The question is whether we Mexicans are going to resolve our differences
with pressure tactics and marches, or with reason and by law," Calderon
said Sunday after testifying before the tribunal's seven judges.
Protesters included grandmothers, politicians and housewives. Many were
drawn by Lopez Obrador's promises to govern for the poor.
"A lot of us are not poor. A lot of us are doing this out of a desire for
justice and equality," said Rebeca Garcia Guzman, a retired health care
worker and middle-class mother.
While Lopez Obrador has called on demonstrators to remain calm, the
protesters say things could turn violent.
"This is the start, and it is going to generate more, higher-impact protest
actions," said Carlos Reyes Gamiz, a city councilman who spent the night in
a tent. "Positions in this conflict are going to harden."
That already appeared to be happening. Maricarmen Montano, a secretary,
stood outside a subway stop and tried to figure out how to get to work. She
was already two hours late and desperate.
"What did we do to deserve this? This is shameful," Montano said.
Montano isn't wealthy. But like many Mexicans, she views herself as part of
an emerging middle class and fears a return to the era of open
confrontation between rich and poor.
"He comes from a low-class neighborhood, and it shows," Montano said of
Lopez Obrador. "If he's upset, he should go to the courts. This kind of
thing shouldn't be settled in the streets."
Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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