The biggest party in congress, the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI), is widely seen as the victor in the mid-term election for the Cámara de Diputados. In a horrifyingly low poll, with 58% abstention, the PRI emerged as the biggest party in congress, only a whisker way from a majority in the 500-seat chamber with 224 seats. Its electoral ally the Partido Verde Ecologista de México secured 17 seats.
Tantalisingly, the other two small parties in the lower chamber, the Partido del Trabajo and Convergencia, have another 11 seats between them (six and five, respectively). Although Convergencia is led by PRI dissident, it could probably be persuaded to back the PRI. This grand alliance would give the PRI 252 seats.
In reality, the PRI is unlikely to punch its weight. It is already facing a messy election to pick the party leader in the lower chamber. The election is dominated by two heavyweights, Elba Esther Gordillo, the PRI's secretary-general and a former leader of the teachers' union, and Manlio Fabio Beltrones, the former governor of the state of Sonora.
Sonora has a high ranking in PRI and Mexican iconography since so many of the heroes of the Revolution hailed from the state, notably Alvaro Obregón. Beltrones, who like Gordillo has presidential ambitions, has the rare distinction of having taken on the New York Times and won, at least a moral victory if not an apology.
This election is already making the PRI high command nervous.The PRI leader, Roberto Madrazo, who has not always seen eye to eye with Gordillo, has appealed to both of the candidates to play fair. The first sign of who is likely to win will become apparent on 14 July. Then the PRI executive committee will decided how the election will take place. Beltrones wants a secret ballot after a month of open campaigning. Gordillo would prefers the decision to be taken in a smoke-filled room, preferably on 15 July.
Tension. The problem Madrazo and the PRI face is that the party is a seething mass of feuds and ambitions. There is no political creed shared by priístas beyond a passion for power. These tensions are likely to burst into the open the closer the party gets to power.
The general assumption that Madrazo will be the party's candidate for the presidency in 2006 is already stirring the ire of the powerful governors. They also have ambitions. One of the most ambitious is Miguel Alemán Velasco, the governor of Veracruz, where the PRI even managed to get a deputy elected who had been kidnapped a month earlier.
AMLO. The strong performance by the PRD has underlined the pivotal role Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the mayor of Mexico City, is likely to play over the next three years. His high popularity -he has over 80% approval ratings after almost three years in the job- powered the PRD to a strong performance in and around Mexico City. The PRD won 13 of the 16 boroughs in Mexico City and 27 of the 30 first-past-the-post congressional seats in the Distrito Federal. The PRD also did well in the neighbouring Estado de México, where all three main parties have their bastions, and in Guerrero.
The problem the PRD faces is that it has nothing but isolated outposts in the north of country. Zacatecas is about as far north as the party's support goes: Baja California Sur is a special case of a split PRI.
The PAN. Although the Partido Acción Nacional (PAN) lost a heap of seats, it was not knocked out anywhere. It is worth noting that the PRI is down to one borough presidency in Mexico City and did not win a single first-past-the-post federal congressional seat in the DF.
The PAN still has its bastions in the Yucatán. It came close to winning the governorship of Campeche, previously considered a PRI stronghold. It did win San Luis Potosí from the PRI and it gave Eduardo Bours, who was expected to sweep home in Sonora for the PRI, a nail-biting run for his money.
The problem the PAN faces is a less pungent version of the one the PRI faces: the PAN has no obvious candidate for 2006. The jostling for the nomination is likely to create tensions between the two wings of the party, the so-called neo-panistas, represented by President Vicente Fox and the old style clericalist panistas.
The most likely PAN candidates for 2006 are Francisco Barrio, who will probably lead the PAN in the lower chamber of congress, and Marta Sahagún, Fox's wife.
Figures. The PRI is unhappy with the allocation of proportionally elected seats in the Cámara. It scored just under 38% support in the elections on Sunday, well ahead of the PAN, which got 30%, and the PRD, which got just under 18%. The PRI's share of the 200 proportionall elected seats falls short of this percentage. It reckons that it should get 74 proportial seats to add to its 159 first-past-the-post seats.
The PRI argues that it should get a total of 231 seats in the lower chamber. This is above the official calculation, which gives the PRI 224 seats in the 500-seat lower chamber.
The official calculation gives the PAN 153 seats in congress, 71 of which will be proportional, and the PRD 95, of which 41 will be proportional. The PVEM will have 17 (14 proportional) and the two other parties to keep their registration, by getting at least 2% of the votes, the Partido del Trabajo and Convergencia, will have six and five proportional seats, respectively.
The difficulty is that proportionally elected seats area allocated not on the national share of the vote but according to how the parties polled in five areas of the country. The added complication is that the PRI was in alliance with the PVEM in some, but not all, areas of the country.
Mood not arithmetic. Mexican commentators have been musing on the lessons to be drawn from the elections. Optimists hope that the new congress, the 59th, will be able, somehow, to agree on the economic structural reform packages which President Vicente Fox proposed but failed to push through congress. Realists are resigned to another wasted three years as the Fox administration's power wanes and politicians and the electorate start to focus on the 2006 elections.
Fox and his ministers, as well as foreign economists, are trying to assess whether any of the botched reforms will have a second chance. This seems unlikely. It is hard to see why the PRI would support a reform of, say, the electricity industry. The argument is that if it does not, the country could run short of power during the next administration.
This forecast is probably based on much faster economic growth than the economy has registered under Fox. There is little reason to believe that growth will pick up in the next three years, so power problems will remain manageable.
Mexico City. The one thing most commentators agree on is that López Obrador will be the man to beat in 2006. To do that his popularity in Mexico City will have to be undermined.
This reasoning is likely to mean that the PAN and the PRI will try to clip Mexico City's lavish financing, which has been a feature of the first part of Fox's administration.
The budget. One reason why AMLO is so popular is that he has got things done: pensioners like their 600-peso-a-month payments and families the cheap (subsidised) milk.
He can afford these populist gestures because the PRD has carefully ensured that Mexico City gets more money from the federal budget (and is allowed to borrow more) than other states and municipalities.
In the past three years the city has increased its spending by 47% (admittedly to only M$77.9bn, or US$7.8bn) . The City has the biggest debt of any municipal or state entity (and increased it by a further M$5bn with a M$5bn bond issue just before the election, when Mexican interest rates dipped to a record low). The City's debt has jumped from M$11.8bn in 1997 to M$37.9bn before the latest bond issue.
Mexico City spends M$9,000 per head per year. Yet the City is the richest part of the country, with an average per capita income of US$22,816, well above the US$6,000 average for the country.
This heavy spending makes AMLO vulnerable.
What seems likely is that the next congress will feature a series of tactical alliances. Congressmen will combine largely against particular policies or individuals. It is hard to see them backing anything as positive and controversial as a reform of the electricity industry or to open up the energy industry to foreign investors.
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