Mexicans go to the polls
Voters decide today whether to elect a free-spending leftist who pledges to put the poor first or a conservative career politician who says private investment and free markets are the road to prosperity.
The presidential election is the first since Vicente Fox’s stunning victory in 2000 ended 71 years of rule by the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI. It will determine whether Mexico becomes the latest Latin American country to move to the left.
Polls predict a close race between conservative Felipe Calderon of Fox’s party and leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, a former Mexico City mayor. The PRI’s Roberto Madrazo was running a distant third, ahead of two minor candidates.
Also being elected were five governors and both houses of Congress.
Accompanied by his two children, Lopez Obrador showed up shortly before the polls opened to cast his vote inside a house in his middle class Mexico City neighbourhood. Surrounded by throngs of journalists, Lopez Obrador did not comment publicly.
Officials hoped to announce a winner within hours of the polls closing at 8pm. (0200 BST), based on a quick count. But they cautioned they would wait if the race was too close.
The election capped months of mudslinging and angry rhetoric that laid bare a broad divide between Mexico’s rich and poor. Lopez Obrador accused Calderon of catering to the rich, while Calderon warned that Lopez Obrador would put at risk the low-interest loans and other gains that helped swell the middle class during Fox’s tenure.
Mexican law limits presidents to one term, and Fox plans to retire to his ranch in December after his replacement is sworn in. He was casting his vote at a school near the presidential residence.
All three candidates promised to strengthen relations with the US while opposing increased border security measures unpopular in Mexico, including building more border walls and the deployment of National Guard troops.
The estimated 10 million Mexicans living in the United States were allowed to vote from abroad for the first time, but the 41,000 ballots they requested weren’t likely to make much of a difference. The effort, thrown together late last year to beat electoral deadlines, wasn’t well publicised in the US.
