Carol Schmidt
Jul 12, 2003, 1:15 PM
Post #3 of 4
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Thanks, Jennifer, and more election info
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I appreciate the prompt response, Jennifer. Today I felt a bit better and was able to do some research myself and found out some more about the elections, in SMA and Mexico overall, from the SMA Chronicles. Since the Chronicles are free to anyone who wants to subscribe, I think it's okay to copy the info they ran on the election. I'll try to find the subscription info on the Chronicles to post here as documentation of this article.
Carol Schmidt
--------------------------- The Election in San Miguel
>The suspense was killing us—voting and counting votes had gone on through July 6th until about dawn on July 7th but opposition candidates had challenged the results and it was not until Wednesday, July 10th at 18.45 that the local office of the IFE (Instituto Federal Electoral) finally announced the results.
>San Miguel’s new Municipal President is Luis Alberto Villarreal a member of the PAN party with 17, 538 votes versus Manuel Rosas of the PRD with 14,833 votes. Luis Ferro of the PRI only garnered 5,684 votes.
>However, the PRD was entitled to some votes from the smaller parties in which case they have 16,188 votes. The difference between the winner and the loser is a scant 1,350 votes.
>Villarreal, 28, is a native of San Miguel. He started his political career at the tender age of 22, winning the election for federal alternative congressman for the State of Guanajuato in 1997. He ran for federal congress in 2000 and won. He has just finished his term as federal congressman. Villarreal studied law at the Universidad Lasallista Benavente in Celaya and perfected his English with studies in England and Ireland. He also has a degree in French from the National University in Mexico City.
>Editor’s note: More about our new Municipal President next week when we interview Luis Alberto Villarreal and find out what plans he has for San Miguel. He takes office on October 10th. Election Results Nationwide
>As of this writing all election results are not in and the IFE has indicated that these will not be in until Sunday, July 13th.
>Nevertheless there is no question that the PRI is the major winner and President Vicente Fox’s party, the PAN, the loser.
>Out of a possible 65 million voters 60% declined to vote in the midterm elections—the highest level of abstentions recorded in the past 30 years. In a televised message President Fox said, “We must also listen to those who did not vote, we must understand their silence.”
>In Congress, the PRI will now be the major party with 222 to 227 legislators. The PAN is expected to have between 148 and 158 new congressmen, a loss of 49 to 59 legislators over the previous elections in 2000. The PRD also increased its representation almost 100% with a total of 100 congressmen in the new congress.
>A major victory for the PRI was in the state of Nuevo León where the candidate for the governorship, Natividad González easily gained over 60% of the votes. The previous governor of Nuevo León, Fernando Canales, had left the governorship when he was appointed Secretary of the Economy in the Fox cabinet. At the present time it is possible that the PRI has also gained the governorships of Campeche, and Sonora although both of these elections are far too close to call. The PAN won Querétaro and San Luis Potosí governorships.
>The real sockdolager came from President Fox’s own bailiwick, San Francisco del Rincón in the state of Guanajuato, where the PRI made a clean sweep winning the municipal presidency and the state and federal congressional seats.
>Roberto Madrazo, President of the PRI handled his party’s success with gloating press interviews and some brand new publicity spots on radio and television in which he thanked the electorate and promised a responsible government for the benefit of all. He also positioned himself as the leading candidate for the presidential elections in 2006.
>In fact these elections seemed to be more about the next elections with presidenciables positioning themselves at the starting gate. Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador of the PRD, Regent of Mexico City, made a clean sweep of all elective post in that district making him a possible presidential candidate in the populist style of the new Brazilian President Lula da Silva.
>Jorge Castañeda, the former Foreign Minister who resigned from the Fox cabinet earlier this year has presidential aspirations but we are not quite sure for which party he would run.
>As for the PAN, they are considering Francisco Barrio, a former cabinet member who has now been elected to Congress. And lest we forget, does Marta Sahagún, the President’s wife have political aspirations, too? To sum it all up: the public in general is fed up with elections and their excessive cost as well as disappointed in the Fox government’s performance thus far.
>While some analysts predict the Congress will continue to block the necessary reforms, it is obvious that in order to win the next presidential election all parties will have to appear as ‘cooperating’ with the federal government for the benefit of the country even though they will eventually take credit for those reforms.>
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