More than One Million Protest Official Election Results in Mexico
Mexico City
More than one million supporters of Mexican presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador jammed into Mexico City's historic Zócalo on Saturday and declared him "the legitimate president" of Mexico.
Delegates and supporters of López Obrador raised their hands to vote during the National Democratic Convention held in Mexico City on Saturday. Mexicans turned independence day into a protest for their winning candidate, while President Vicente Fox and the officially-declared president-elect celebrated outside the capital.
As his supporters roared approval, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a popular former Mexico City mayor, vowed to set up his own government and to fight against "a band of white-collar crooks and corrupt politicians" who he said stole the election from him.
He told the massive crowd of supporters that he accepted the responsibility of being president because he rejects the imposition of Felipe Calderón and what he called "the rupture of constitutional order." He said: "They can keep their pirated institutions and their phony president, but they cannot keep our homeland and our national dignity."
Described as a national democratic convention, the huge rally was characterized by some media sources as a tactic with deep roots in Mexican history: a "national convention" to draw up a new agenda for the country. By a show of hands, the crowd unanimously denied that Felipe Calderón had won the July elections. They declared Andres Manuel López Obrador president, asked him to form a cabinet and supported a constitutional convention.
Some historians said the convention echoed the alternative plans for Mexico put forward by revolutionary heroes like Emilio Zapata and Francisco I. Madero 100 years ago. The newspaper La Jornada quoted one historian, Lorenzo Meyer, who said: "The slow, difficult, incremental construction of the Mexican nation and state has passed through dozens of plans, made in the heat of political conflict." He added: "The idea of conventions and plans is something very much part of Mexican history."
More than one million supporters of Mexican presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador jammed into Mexico City's historic Zócalo on Saturday and declared him "the legitimate president" of Mexico.
Delegates and supporters of López Obrador raised their hands to vote during the National Democratic Convention held in Mexico City on Saturday. Mexicans turned independence day into a protest for their winning candidate, while President Vicente Fox and the officially-declared president-elect celebrated outside the capital.
As his supporters roared approval, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a popular former Mexico City mayor, vowed to set up his own government and to fight against "a band of white-collar crooks and corrupt politicians" who he said stole the election from him.
He told the massive crowd of supporters that he accepted the responsibility of being president because he rejects the imposition of Felipe Calderón and what he called "the rupture of constitutional order." He said: "They can keep their pirated institutions and their phony president, but they cannot keep our homeland and our national dignity."
Described as a national democratic convention, the huge rally was characterized by some media sources as a tactic with deep roots in Mexican history: a "national convention" to draw up a new agenda for the country. By a show of hands, the crowd unanimously denied that Felipe Calderón had won the July elections. They declared Andres Manuel López Obrador president, asked him to form a cabinet and supported a constitutional convention.
Some historians said the convention echoed the alternative plans for Mexico put forward by revolutionary heroes like Emilio Zapata and Francisco I. Madero 100 years ago. The newspaper La Jornada quoted one historian, Lorenzo Meyer, who said: "The slow, difficult, incremental construction of the Mexican nation and state has passed through dozens of plans, made in the heat of political conflict." He added: "The idea of conventions and plans is something very much part of Mexican history."
posted by Alice at
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
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