In a 7-0 ruling, the Electoral Court of the Federal Judiciary (TEPJF), ruled that they had rejected Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) claims that the Presidential election had been plagued by massive fraud. The court stated that López Obrador had failed to prove that the irregularities in many of the polling places did not stem from fraud.

TEPJF stated that they had thrown out the results from hundreds of polling stations where major irregularities were shown to have taken place, which meant annulling 81,000 votes for Felipe Calderón and 76,897 for López Obrador. Therefore, leaving Calderon with 4,000 fewer votes from his original 244,000-vote margin. The tribunal decided that the outcome of the partial recount was not enough to overcome Calderón’s margin of victory.

However, the tribunal did stop short of officially naming Calderón as Mexico’s next President, by law the tribunal has until Sept 6 to name the winner of the election to declare a winner.

It was not a surprise that López Obrador denounced the court’s ruling.

AMLO has vowed to create a parallel government and is urging Mexicans not to recognize Calderón as president. On Setp 16, Mexico’s Independce day, AMLO and his supporters plan to hold their National Democratic Convention in the city’s main square, the Plaza de la Constitución, to plan the future of there parallel government

“We do not recognize Felipe Calderón as president, nor any officials he appoints, nor any acts carried out by his de-facto government,” López Obrador said after the court ruling, which he claims overlooked evidence of fraud in the July 2 elections.

Now that Calderón is one-step closer being named president, his party, the conservative National Action Party (PAN) is starting to flex its muscle in Mexico’s lower house of Congress. After the new lawmakers were sworn in on the first day of the new Mexican Congress, the PAN pushed one of its own members, Jorge Zermeño Infante, into a key leadership position in the Chamber of Deputies that is traditionally held for the second largest political party, Democratic Revolution Party (PRD). PAN was able to accomplish this by forming an alliance with the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and the Green Party.

The PAN, with 206 deputies in the 500-member lower house, needed plenty of help from the PRI´s 104-deputy contingent, as well as from the Green Party and a minor party – and got just enough. The vote confirming Zermeño was 335 to 161, barely more than the two-thirds majority needed.

This did not sit well the PRD, what would have been a straight vote without discussion; they had initiated an unprecedented floor debate.

Using language similar to its post-electoral complaints, the PRD accused the PAN of “imposing” the Mesa Directiva president and predicted “ungovernability” in the lower house.

“Do you in the PAN think we’re going to accept your impositions?” said Juan Guerra, a PRD deputy.

“You are violating accords, trying to exercise a majority that the people didn´t give you. You´re going to have to bear the consequences,” he said.

It is uncertain where things will go from here, but one thing is for certain – political tensions continue to grip Mexico and some are beginning to worry this might spark into a mini civil war.

Via / The Herald Mexico – El Universal