MEXICO: The outcome of Mexico's presidential election remained in doubt yesterday as conservative candidate Felipe Calderon, marginally ahead in the count, demanded electoral authorities declare him winner while his rival, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (also called Amlo), insisted on a vote-by-vote recount of the poll.
"The attempt to question the will of Mexican voters is an act of aggression and an insult to us all," said Manuel Espino, spokesman for Mr Calderon's National Action Party (PAN). Orders were given for party members to begin celebrations even as the electoral authority began a partial recount which will conclude tomorrow.
The Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) refused to declare a winner after it was discovered that three million votes had not been tallied in the preliminary results. By early yesterday morning, the missing votes had reduced Mr Calderon's lead from 400,000 to 250,000, just 0.6 of a point.
Meanwhile, reports filtered in of further discrepancies as marked ballots were found in rubbish tips and tallies on some election boxes failed to match the number of votes inside. Amlo supporters claimed that an average of 3,000 votes in each of the country's 300 voting districts have been mislaid or miscounted, making him the real winner.
Luis Ugalde, IFE president, called on the rival candidates to act "responsibly" in the coming days and abide by the authority's decisions.
However, after two days of sidestepping the "F" word, Amlo finally came out and demanded a total recount "to eliminate the shadow of fraud". The former mayor of Mexico City denounced the preliminary results as "manipulated and worthless", destined "to impose Calderon before the results were in".
The discrepancies began when voter turn-out, estimated at 59 per cent, or 42 million votes, fell three million short of the number that appeared during the unofficial count. Suspicions were also raised when fewer votes appeared to have been cast in the presidential race than in congressional elections, a unique occurrence in a country where the executive enjoys unrivalled powers.
The missing votes did not indicate a massive fraud but were the result of an agreed-upon mechanism for temporarily shelving votes that contained an error but could be declared valid on further inspection.
Amlo's supporters have already begun organising "civil resistance" committees to complement the legal challenge being prepared through the courts.
During a previous attempt to bar Amlo from running for office, his supporters mobilised over one million people in Mexico City and forced President Fox to end the challenge, which centred on a minor misdeed.
Mexico City voted overwhelmingly for Amlo in Sunday's vote and a determined disobedience campaign could bring the country to a halt.
The outcome of the legal challenge must be resolved by the end of August and an official winner declared by September 9th.
Amlo's Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) was victim of electoral fraud in Mexico's 1988 presidential elections which brought Carlos Salinas to power.
On that occasion, first returns indicated a small lead for left-wing candidate Cuauhtemoc Cardenas when the computer system suddenly crashed.
A week later, the refreshed computers had reversed the initial trend and Mr Salinas was declared the winner.