MEXICO: A massive crowd marched through Mexico City yesterday to back a leftist who claims he was robbed of victory in a fiercely contested presidential election and is demanding a vote-by-vote recount.
At least 100,000 protesters swarmed toward the central Zocalo, one of the world's largest squares, where Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador was to rally his supporters for a campaign of civil disobedience.
"Lopez Obrador, hold on, the people are rising up," supporters chanted yesterday, many dressed in the bright yellow of his leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD).
Mexico was plunged into a political crisis by the close July 2nd election, which saw ruling party conservative Felipe Calderon beat Mr Lopez Obrador by just about 244,000 votes out of 41 million cast.
Mr Lopez Obrador, an austere former mayor of Mexico City who campaigned on promises to help Mexico's poor with ambitious welfare and infrastructure programs, claims the result was rigged against him.
"The elections were filthy," said Maria Teresa Priego (57), a city government employee. "We are here to support a humble man, a hard-working man." It was the third mass protest in the last three weeks, and many expected it to be the biggest.
The crowd grew steadily as it approached the Zocalo, which holds well over 100,000 people and was once the centre of the Aztec empire. It is still the heart of modern Mexico, home to the National Palace and the capital's main cathedral.
Mr Lopez Obrador says vote counts were fiddled at more than half the country's roughly 130,000 polling stations. He is challenging them before Mexico's highest electoral court, and says he will only accept the result if there is a recount.
While stressing his protests will stay peaceful, Mr Lopez Obrador upped the ante last week by declaring he was the country's legitimate president and warning his supporters had plenty of energy for more protests.
However large the latest protest, it is unlikely to directly influence the seven electoral court judges who have until August 31st to decide whether there is a case to reopen ballot boxes. Their choices range from throwing out Mr Lopez Obrador's case and declaring Mr Calderon the winner, to ordering a partial or full recount or even annulling the election and calling for a repeat.
An annulment is thought highly unlikely and, without it, the court must formally declare Mexico's president-elect by September 6th.
Mr Calderon insists the vote was clean and that no recount is needed. While his party's lawyers are fighting the PRD at the electoral court, he is trying to pull support from other opposition parties for reforms he plans to push through once he takes office in December.