Protesters flood Mexican capital to back leftist

Despite Obrador's supporters, a poll showed most Mexicans did not want a recount. Picture / Reuters

MEXICO CITY - Up to 200,000 protesters poured onto the streets of Mexico's capital on Sunday to back leftist candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador's claim that he lost the July 2 presidential election because of fraud.

Chanting "You are not alone," large crowds marched with runner-up Lopez Obrador past hotels and skyscrapers toward the Zocalo square, once centre of the Aztec empire and now the heart of modern Mexico.

The size of the protest, bigger than a similar march last week, gave Lopez Obrador a lift in his attempt to persuade an election court to declare him winner of the ultra-close race.

The court is investigating complaints by Lopez Obrador, the former mayor of Mexico City, that electoral officials altered the vote count to favour ruling party conservative Felipe Calderon, who won by 0.58 of a percentage point, or just over 240,000 votes.

"I feel sad, angry and impotent because the people's will was not respected," demonstrator Salvador Torres said.

The vote split Mexico only six years after President Vicente Fox ended 71 years of one-party rule. The uncertainty following the election has raised fears of political gridlock and maybe even violence in a key US ally in Latin America.

The court must rule on the legality of the election and declare a president-elect by early September.

Leftists streamed into the capital from all over Mexico to back Lopez Obrador, known as AMLO from his initials. An austere widower, he vows to take millions of Mexicans out of poverty.

Five people carrying yellow flags of Lopez Obrador's Party of the Democratic Revolution rode horses through the Spanish colonial city centre.

A youth dressed in a black Che Guevara tee-shirt carried a banner of the Virgin of Guadalupe, Mexico's most revered religious icon, reading, "The mother of Mexico is with AMLO."

Calderon, a former energy minister, has called for calm.

European Union observers say there was no major fraud on voting day but leftists have been deeply suspicious since a 1988 presidential contest that was almost certainly stolen from their candidate by the then government.

Lopez Obrador was to address the crowd later on Sunday local time and expected to announce further protests to keep the pressure up on the court, composed of seven magistrates who are seen as being free from political bias.

But despite Lopez Obrador's ability to put supporters on the streets, a poll in the Reforma newspaper on Saturday showed most Mexicans do not agree with his call for a recount.

He has asked the electoral court to carry out a vote-for-vote recount, beyond the original count and the tally sheet recount last week that showed Calderon the winner.

Sixty per cent of people polled by Reforma said they did not want a new recount, compared to 37 per cent who backed Lopez Obrador's proposal.

But the question put to interviewees in the poll did not mention the allegations of fraud. It only asked if the votes should be counted a third time.

Most Mexicans believe the election results are trustworthy and 75 per cent think the Federal Electoral Institute, which organised the vote is impartial, the poll showed.

- REUTERS