Mexican leftist says he is president, vows protests

MEXICO CITY - The leftist contesting Mexico's July 2 election on the grounds of vote-rigging declared himself president today and said his supporters would step up a campaign of civil disobedience next week.

Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who lost the vote count to conservative rival Felipe Calderon by a tiny margin, said in a television interview that a rally next week in Mexico City would show his backers have the energy to keep up protests.

"I am already president. I won the presidential election. I am president of Mexico by the will of the majority of Mexicans," Lopez Obrador told Univision's Here and Now show, scheduled to be aired tomorrow.

"I think the people will not tire," he added. "We are going to beat (our opponents) because the people are on our side."

The leftist, whose fraud allegations are being examined by Mexico's electoral court, has torn into Calderon in countless interviews in recent days. His rival has opted to keep a lower profile and set about preparing his presidency.

Despite strong rhetoric about a "dirty war" against him, Lopez Obrador has kept protest rallies by his backers peaceful. This week, supporters protested in the lobby of an upscale hotel and lit hundreds of candles in the Zocalo square.

The leftist plans to announce a civil resistance campaign at a rally in central Mexico City next week as the next step in pushing for a vote-by-vote recount.

"We are not going to sit here with our arms folded," he said in an advance copy of the interview made available to Reuters.

Asked whether civil disobedience could include blocking roads and taking over Mexico's international airports or highways, Lopez Obrador said: "Everything that could mean civil resistance. Everything that could mean defending the vote, defending democracy. The limit is nonviolence."

Financial markets, which are rooting for Calderon to be president, are keeping a close watch on tensions in Mexico, which slid into political crisis when Lopez Obrador contested the ruling party candidate's 0.58 percentage point win.

Lopez Obrador says vote counts were manipulated at some 72,000 of the country's roughly 130,000 polling stations. He told Univision that tally sheets included some 1.5 million votes that were not backed up by voting slips.

He said President Vicente Fox and Calderon were behind the fraud, as well as "bandits" within the IFE electoral institute that ran the election.

"President Fox has been saying openly for two or three years to anyone who will listen that there is no way I am going to be president. He had a hand in everything," he said.

Lopez Obrador is a former Indian rights activist who blocked oil wells in his home state of Tabasco to protest pollution and who led a 900-km march to Mexico City after losing what he said was a rigged state election in 1994.

This week, he wrote to Calderon and challenged him to agree to a vote-by-vote recount that both would respect. Calderon rejected the offer, insisting the election was clean.

- REUTERS