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 Editorials | Issues | May 2007 
Mexico's 2006 Ballots Won’t Be Saved
 The Herald Mexico
| | The approximately 40 million ballots became some of the most famous documents in Mexican history shortly after preliminary official results showed Felipe Calderón edging out Andrés Manuel López Obrador by just more than half a percentage point. |
Any last hope for a citizens- or media-led recount of the July 2, 2006, presidential ballots all but flickered out Wednesday when the nation´s top electoral court rejected a last-ditch appeal for public access.
Instead, the Electoral Tribunal (TEPJF) cleared the way for final destruction of all the ballots.
General Council members of the Federal Electoral Institute (IFE) said they were only awaiting Wednesday´s TEPJF action to set a date for destroying the ballots.
All that´s left to decide is how the deed will be done - by burning, burying or grinding them into a recyclable pulp.
The approximately 40 million ballots became some of the most famous documents in Mexican history shortly after preliminary official results showed Felipe Calderón edging out Andrés Manuel López Obrador by just more than half a percentage point. The López Obrador campaign said there had been ballot tampering first at the voting stations and then at the storage sites.
The TEPJF rejected a petition for a full vote-by-vote recount, insisting there was no legal basis for it. Calderón was confirmed as winner on Sept. 5, and took office on Dec. 1.
Later, some of the media expressed interest in organizing an unofficial recount, much as news organizations did with the disputed Florida ballots after George Bush´s election-deciding victory in that state in 2000.
But on April 25, the TEPJF turned down a request for ballot access by private citizen Daniel Lizárraga and others. The tribunal ruled the ballots were not public property, and that the only entities that legally qualify to count them are the 300 district commissions that operate under IFE, and the TEPJF magistrates themselves.
The ruling was criticized by Horacio Duarte, the liaison to IFE from López Obrador´s Democratic Revolution Party (PRD). "Far from clearing up doubts about this fraudulent chapter in the July 2 election, the tribunal has only assured that the uncertainty will continue," he said at the time.
Wednesday´s TEPJF action was a rejection of Lizárraga´s appeal of the April 25 ruling. |
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