A massive crowd marched through Mexico City on Sunday to back a leftist who claims he was robbed of victory in a fiercely contested presidential election and is demanding a vote-by-vote recount. At least 100,000 protesters swarmed toward the central Zocalo, one of the world's largest squares, where Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador was to rally his supporters for a campaign of civil disobedience. | | “Lopez Obrador, hold on, the people are rising up!” |
"Lopez Obrador, hold on, the people are rising up," supporters chanted on Sunday, many dressed in the bright yellow of his leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution, or PRD.
Mexico was plunged into a political crisis by the close July 2 election, which saw ruling party conservative Felipe Calderon beat Lopez Obrador by just around 244,000 votes out of 41 million cast. Lopez Obrador, an austere former mayor of Mexico City who campaigned on promises to help Mexico's poor with ambitious welfare and infrastructure programs, claims the result was rigged against him. |