The Amigos de Fox, who backed the president's election campaign, seem to have got off on a technicality. The PGR said that there was no evidence to suggest that the money that was moved around the accounts was the product of criminal activities. It said that it could only investigate if there was evidence that the money involved was produced by crime.
The IFE now has two weeks, starting from today, to decide whether to provide more evidence or let the matter drop. The IFE is hinting strongly that it has enough evidence to find the Amigos guilty of breaking its electoral rules on campaign finance.
* No more advertising. President Vicente Fox finally conceded last week that it was not the executive's role to encourage people to vote in the mid-term congressional elections on 6 July. He accepted that this was properly the role of the Instituto Federal Electoral (IFE).
Opposition parties had become annoyed with Fox for refusing to abide by the terms of the agreement with the states that all promotional broadcasts should be suspended for the final three weeks of the election campaign.
The opposition parties had claimed that Fox and the government were using the broadcasts to shore up the crumbling vote for the Partido Acción Nacional (PAN).
The latest opinion poll, in Milenio, shows that the main opposition party, the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) is on course to increase its representation in the 500-seat lower chamber. It reckons that the PRI will get 42% of the seats and the PAN 36%. The third main party, the Partido de la Revolución Democrática (PRD), is also on course to increase its representation: it will get 19%, Milenio says. That will mean a virtual doubling of its representation, to around 100 seats.
End of preview - This article contains approximately 349 words.
Subscribers: Log in now to read the full article
Not a Subscriber?
Choose from one of the following options
