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 Editorials | At Issue | September 2006 
Deeply Divided Mexico Marks Independence Day
 Alexandre Peyrille - AFP
| | Mexican President Vicente Fox (R) waves the national flag in Dolores Hidalgo Community in Guanajuato State during celebrations of Mexico's Independence Day at the National Palace in Mexico City. Hundreds of thousands of Mexicans turned independence day into a protest for a losing presidential candidate in Mexico City, while Fox and the president-elect celebrated outside the capital. (AFP/Feliz Lozano) |
Hundreds of thousands of Mexicans turned independence day into a protest for a losing presidential candidate in Mexico City, while President Vicente Fox and the president-elect celebrated outside the capital citing fears of violence.
Organizers said 750,000 to a million of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador's supporters chanted "The people united will never be defeated" in the capital's Zocalo square.
The crowd convened a so-called National Democratic Convention, which proclaimed Lopez Obrador the "legitimate president" of Mexico, set his inauguration for November 20, and, despite driving rain, even set to work on his political agenda.
Lopez Obrador, a former Mexico City mayor, has organized massive protests since his narrow July 2 defeat to conservative Felipe Calderon.
Calderon, a member of Fox's conservative National Action Party, is to be inaugurated December 1 as Mexico's new president after winning by less than a one percent of the vote.
Mexico's electoral court only last week handed down its final decision, declaring Calderon as Mexico's president-elect.
The ruling, which cannot be appealed, came after the losing side launched weeks of street protests and filed dozens of corruption allegations and scores of legal objections.
Although Obrador lost the election by a narrow margin, his protest campaign has drawn dwindling support among the wider public. A poll released last week showed some 74 percent accept the decision of the electoral court declaring Calderon the winner.
Lopez Obrador, however, vows to set up a parallel government. The three leftist parties that had formed a coalition for the presidential election have extended their alliance through 2009 and adopted as their campaign slogan: "For the Good of All, the Poor First."
Lopez Obrador's supporters temporarily struck their tent city in the heart of the capital for the independence day military parade, which took place without incident.
The occupation began July 30 to block major streets, at a cost in disrupted business estimated by a business group Friday at 709 million dollars.
For weeks, Fox had insisted he would not deviate from the regular presidential agenda, but on Thursday the Mexican Senate ordered him to find an alternative after reported threats of disruptions from the leftists.
The Mexican president traditionally appears on the balcony of the National Palace, rings a historic bell and leads crowds in chants of "Viva Mexico!" on the eve of the September 16 holiday.
However, on Friday, Fox backed down on appearing at the public ceremony for security reasons.
"The government had learned from intelligence services that some of the radical organizations within 'For the Good of All' plan violence against those attending celebrations in the Zocalo," presidential spokesman Ruben Aguilar said Friday.
Lopez Obrador vowed to deliver a rival ceremonial public call for independence late Friday at the Zocalo, the giant downtown square where the protests are centered.
Instead of marking the day in the capital, Fox celebrated in Dolores Hidalgo, 260 kilometers (160 miles) from Mexico City.
Dolores Hidalgo, in the central Guanajuato state, is where Father Miguel Hidalgo rang church bells and called on Mexicans to take up arms against Spain in 1810, starting the revolution that culminated in Mexico's independence from Spain in 1821.
Lopez Obrador insists he is the rightful leader of Mexico, and this week rejected Calderon as an "illegitimate president" responsible for a "coup d'etat" which he said was sending "Mexico's institutions to hell."
It was the second time in two weeks the leftists forced Fox to break with tradition.
On September 1, lawmakers from the opposition Party of the Democratic Revolution blocked Fox, who supported Calderon in the presidential race, from taking the podium to deliver his annual address to Congress.
He delivered the speech via television instead. |
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