By Alejandro Melgoza Rocha
MEXICO CITY
The National Electoral Institute of Mexico (INE) said tonight through its “rapid count” system that left-wing candidate, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, became the new president of the country.
Lopez Obrador, from the “Juntos Haremos Historia” (Together We’ll Make History) coalition of the Morena PES-PT parties, obtained between 53% and 53.8% of the total votes; Ricardo Anaya from the “Por Mexico al Frente” movement of the PAN-PRD-MC parties, got between 22,1% and 22,8%; while Jose Antonio Meade of the “Todos por México” coalition of the PRI-PVEM-Panal parties got between 15,7% and 16,3% of the total votes, and the independent Jaime Rodriguez got between 5,3% and 5,5%.
As the polls had predicted, the 64-year-old politician who ran for president for the third time, got the lead during the election process that began at 8:00 a.m and finished at 18:00 p.m local time.
Tonights “rapid count” results are a statistic based on voter tallies. “The most trustworthy and fastest source of information”, according to the INE.
During the next few hours, the second phase will begin with the Preliminary Electoral Results Program, which published images and data on the voter tallies and voting posts, which takes 24 hours to process.
It won´t be until July 4th when the “official count”, that is to say, the legally binding results, become public.
Historic elections
This Sunday´s elections included voting on 3.400 posts (629 federal posts and 2.777 local posts), among them 128 senatorial posts, 500 seats on the Chamber of Deputies, eight state governorships and the election of the mayor of Mexico City.
According to the Executive Directorate of the Electoral Organization, 156.836 voting posts were set up in the different electoral districts of 30 out of the 32 states in the country.
During the polls, 29.393 electoral overseers participated, 650 of the from abroad, and 80 of them belonging to the Organization of American States (OAS).
According to the INE, these were the largest elections in Mexican history, due to the large amount of posts (18.000) up for election.
Additionally, until June 28th, 95.953 votes were received from abroad, 80% of the coming from the U.S. This is the largest voter turnout from outside the country during the last three elections: 2006, 33.111 votes, 2012, 40.961 votes.
Who is Lopez Obrador?
The candidate for the “Juntos Haremos Historia” coalition was born in the state of Tabasco and, since he began his political career, he has belonged to several opposition movements.
He participated in the presidential race of 2006 and 2012, saying that the country was run by a “power mafia”.
His detractors insist that he has links to Venezuelan populism, though his supporters consider that his tenure as mayor of Mexico City is a clear example of his “pragmatism with a social view”.
Anadolu Agency spoke with his backers, who said that he is the second contemporary Mexican president with a left wing, progressive and social agenda.
The last president that matched this criterion, they said, was Lazaro Cardenas, who spearheaded the expropriation of oil companies.
During the closure of his campaign this past June 27th, Lopez Obrador said that as soon as his victory is announced, he will call for a cabinet meeting in order to start working on the 2018-2024 government program.
Among his most noteworthy proposals, is the pacification process in face of the violent situation, which he called an “amnesty”, during which he will call on victims, civil society organizations, religious leaders, and international organizations such as the UN, as well as pope Francis.
He will also cut the salaries of high ranking government officials, cancel the pension of former presidents, sell the presidential airplane, reduce his own salary and will call on a “government of austerity” amongst his collaborators.
*Ahmed Fawzi Mostefai contributed to this report
