Expert Opinion: Mexico's Electoral Tribunal has finished recounts for Lopez Obrador (Translation)

eluniversal.com.mx ^ | August 13, 2006 | Arturo Zárate Vite ( translated by self )

[StJacques]

The TEPJF will begin alleviation of appeals of electoral inconformity

The Ex-Executive Secretary of the IFE,¹ Maria del Carmen Alanis Figueroa, assures that they will not open a single additional electoral packet.

With the end of the partial recount of votes in the 11,839 electoral packets of the presidential election, the Electoral Tribunal of the Judicial Power of the Federation (TEPJF) now has all the elements to begin to alleviate the 374 appeals of electoral inconformity, according to Maria del Carmen Alanis Figueroa, Ex-Executive Secretary of the IFE.

In her analysis of the phase that the tribunal is about to finish, she makes clear that as for the challenges of the For the Good of All coalition,² the tribunal will not be opening a single additional electoral packet.

Nevertheless, she does not rule out that another procedure of that type could be carried out, even though in a lesser number of precincts, if something should come of the challenges which the PAN party has made about the counting of the official reports of the District Councils.

For Alanis Figueroa, who has a Masters Degree in Political Analysis from the University of London, more than 15 years electoral experience, and has worked in the tribunal and in the IFE; since last August 5th the TEPJF has closed the possibility of opening more packets as the For the Good of All coalition has requested.

"The only cases which eventually could lead to the opening of additional electoral packets, would be to analyze the lawsuits of inconformity presented by the PAN party, which make a similar assumption, where there is an arithmetic or adding error or misconduct in the counting of a precinct's votes; those are the only cases in which other packets could eventually be opened by exception," she explained.

In the opinion of the investigator, the member magistrates of the upper chamber of the tribunal then would have all the elements to resolve the appeals of inconformity.

"They have under their control the proof which the PAN party and the coalition have handed over, the election reports brought by the IFE, the fulfillment or breach of the information or documentation requirements which the magistrates made to the participants and now the results of the partial recount of votes in 11,839 precincts of 149 districts of 26 states of the country."

Therefore, for the distinguished Alanis Figueroa, the next step will be to resolve one by one the appeals of inconformity submitted by the PAN party (133) and the For the Good of All coalition (231).

There is one more from private citizen Saul Beristain, who submitted an appeal of inconformity against the [IFE] President Advisor Luis Carlos Ugalde and his declaration of the validity of the presidential election.

To these 365 cases there would be added nine more which the coalition just presented, on August 4, outside the term established by the law.³

In total, the member magistrates of the upper chamber will have to resolve 374 appeals of inconformity, by the 3rd of September at the latest.⁴

The distinguished Carmen Alanis maintained that the tribunal has been very clear about the scope of the partial recount it ordered August 5.

"Once you have in your hands the circumstancial reports of the recount, then you will have all the elements to resolve the challenges."

"In the specific revision of each one of the appeals of inconformity, they can also determine the nullification of precincts, in the supposed instance that the causes for doing so established by the law are fulfilled," she considered.

She remembered that in other proceedings, the tribunal has annulled the voting in precincts, for errors in the vote totals and substitution of civil employees of the precinct directing desks.

Once this cleansing is done, the tribunal would then proceed to carrying out the final counting of votes of the presidential election.

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Translator's Notes:

¹Acronym of the Instituto Federal Electoral, or the Federal Electoral Institute.

²The "For the Good of All" coalition represents the alliance between Lopez Obrador's PRD (Party of the Democratic Revolution), the Labor party, and the Covergence for Democracy party supporting Lopez Obrador's presidential candidacy.

³This refers to a number of additional precincts from the state of Puebla (just east of Mexico City) which the tribunal agreed to examine, even though Lopez Obrador's legal team missed the filing deadline.

⁴I'm assuming an error either in what was spoken to the reporter or what was transcribed in the interview. The article says "August 3," which has already passed and the known deadline for the tribunal to reach its decisions is September 3.

[StJacques]

I think the opinions Ms. Figueroa expresses are no doubt accurate and probably give us a preview of what we can expect from the tribunal over the next few weeks. The recount for Lopez Obrador and his coalition has run its course and he clearly did not get the results he needed. We have seen no official numbers and we are left to ponder just whose public statements to believe about what those actual numbers are, but it appears that the margin of victory for Calderon was reduced slightly, perhaps by as much as 6,000 votes, which is fairly insignificant, considering that the margin going into the recount was 243,934 votes and most prognosticators suggested that since recounts were ordered in 9.07% of all precincts that AMLO needed to show a gain at least approaching that percentage of the final margin, which would be somewhere in the neighborhood of 20,000 votes.

I expect to see some hard and fast numbers soon, and especially relating to the counting in the state of Guanajuato, which has concluded with Lopez Obrador's people screaming about "irregularities" but we have no numbers as of yet. My guess is that the louder they scream the less advantage they gained.

[StJacques]

A Mex-Elex ping for you all.

Anyone wishing to track all of the translations pertaining to the Mexican post-election controversy can retrieve them using the forum's "keyword" search option with the unique keyword -- STJTRANSLATION -- or by just clicking that keyword above.

[Burlem]

They learned from the left in this country, if you lose yell fraud.

[GeronL]

now what??

will there be a confrontation between the state and local authorities against the federal one?

[shield]

Thanks for the update.

[GeronL]

Hillary and Soros are taking notes, they might try something in 2008 should she lose a close one - especially if she loses while getting a popular vote majority... ACORN and others might be sent out to start riots.

put nothing past them.

[StJacques]

"now what??"

I wish I knew the answer to that one GeronL. But my experience of observing the Latin American Left is that when they don't get their way they begin the process of their "Miserification" of the country, and especially the poor, to teach everyone a lesson.

I'm going to keep my eye on it. I have a hard time believing this will all pass without some kind of major tumult.

[Tzimisce]

This is racist! The black vote was scared away! And Pat Buchanan's name was too close to the Communist's!

[Shuttle Shucker]

Someone in Mexico City who is sick of the Left at this point just e-mailed me the following:

As for Chavez he is stronger than ever. He is sure to be a dictator for life. He just signed a huge economic deal with Russia that will allow the Russian government's oil company to drill for oil in Venezuela and he signed a huge
arms contract with them that will make Chavez's military the most powerful in Latin America. Chavez wants to take over from Castro and lead the Leftist revolution throughout Latin America using his oil revenues (he owns Citgo in the United States).

The Latin Left is now more dangerous than it ever was and how about this for a kicker... Venezuela has a good chance of getting a seat on the UN's Security Council. Another platform that Chavez can use to vilify the US and
gain more Latin recruits.
_________________________________

It's good for us to be mindful of such potential problems. This same friend predicts Chavez will win the reelection bid this December by 80%. Hopefully not?

[StJacques]

I would say "not" on Chavez's December vote. He is likely to win, but by something just under 60% will be my guess.

[Burlem]

I think Chavez will win as well, UN Security Council? Sure why not, He can handle that. Who is the goon that is Head of UN Human Rights Council? Nice people over there. Why are they here and why are we pouring so much money into the UN, what good are they? Send them to Venezuela, or...........France.

[Enterprise]

Thank you bump.

[Texan5]

Thanks for the update-I keep hoping Obrador and his goons (or is it loons?) will just go away when this is done, but I fear he will more likely try to pour gasoline on his fire because it appears to be dying down. I hope he gets taken away in handcuffs if he tries that...

[Shuttle Shucker]

or a straight jacket, like some political cartoons in Mexico depict...

[StJacques]

". . . Obrador and his goons (or is it loons?) . . ."

How about "looney goons"?

[norton]

What about this part?

"The only cases which eventually could lead to the opening of additional electoral packets, would be to analyze the lawsuits of inconformity presented by the PAN party, which make a similar assumption, where there is an arithmetic or adding error or misconduct in the counting of a precinct's votes"

Sounds like they expect this to take a LONG time !/?)

[StJacques]

"Sounds like they expect this to take a LONG time !"

My personal prediction is that they will render their decision Saturday, August 19. I don't expect them to have to undertake anything significant to meet the challenges the PAN party has submitted. And I also expect to hear by Wednesday or Thursday their announcement of the settlement of AMLO's suits.

[norton]

You are speaking legally, what about 'the streets"?

Are the (farther) leftists ready to take their medicine?

[Shuttle Shucker]

Why is it that no media outlet mentions how many (or hopefully how few) people turned out for ObraGore's gathering in the Zocalo this evening? The figure seems completely ignored in this regurgitating coverage of it, for example:

http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/notas/368591.html

Might anybody know how many showed up? I heard 4 thousand showed up last Saturday from one source who voted for him down there. She says folks are sick of AMLO's antics.

[Shuttle Shucker]

Wanna see how poorly ObraGore's doing according to those betting on who Mexico's next president will be?