By IPS Correspondents
MEXICO CITY, May 10 2006 (IPS)

Mudslinging between the candidates in Mexico’s presidential election campaign is polarising voters and further heating up a climate of tension stoked by conflicts between the government and trade unionists and rural workers, in which three people have lost their lives in the last three weeks.

With less than two months to go before the Jul. 2 elections, the two main candidates to the presidency, Andrés López Obrador of the leftwing Party of Democratic Revolution (PRD), and Felipe Calderón of the governing National Action Party (PAN), have resorted to backstabbing and personal attacks in their campaigns, leaving no room for neutrality.

Former Mexico City mayor López Obrador is “a schizophrenic, and a danger to Mexico,” while the conservative Calderón is a “lying puppet manipulated by those above”: these are just two examples of the verbal attacks launched at each other by the rivals.

“The candidates’ strategy at this time is to polarise the election with negative campaigns. This should not scare people, it’s part of the plan, and could ‘work’ from the point of view of both parties, although it will not necessarily attract voters nor benefit democracy,” Alberto González, an independent political consultant, told IPS.

While the campaign continues, various social conflicts have flared up.

Since February, the administration of Vicente Fox has been in dispute with the miners’ union, whose leader is not recognised by the president. The conflict has given rise to a number of strikes at production plants, and street demonstrations called by national union federations, several of whose leaders support López Obrador.

And last week, the People’s Front in Defence of the Land (FPDT), a rural workers’ organisation in the town of San Salvador Atenco, 15 kilometres from the capital, clashed with police over the relocation of flower growers’ stalls from an unauthorised area, with the outcome of one person dead and more than 30 wounded.

By means of beatings, house searches and tear gas, the police regained control of the town of 40,000 and jailed the leaders of the FPDT – a group that protested violently in 2002 and blocked the government’s plan to build a new international airport in the area, thus becoming a social force to be reckoned with in the community.

“Subcomandante Marcos”, the head of the Zapatista guerrilla movement, on a visit to the capital as part of a peaceful tour of the country, said the FPDT deserves the support of all social activists. He also said that he would remain in Mexico City to lead protests demanding that the people in jail be freed.

The government has chosen the route of “repression” in order to polarise the country and so undermine the chances of López Obrador, political scientist Luis Ortiz from the National Autonomous University of Mexico told IPS.

The leftwing candidate, meanwhile, said the government lacked the political acumen to solve social conflicts.

According to Calderón, the answer to social tension is to strictly enforce the law and bring agitators to trial.

The recent events in Atenco gave “Marcos the perfect excuse and the ideal media spotlight to try to become a leading figure in the presidential raceàHe is the winner in this crisis, even though his prestige is at an all-time low,” wrote Ricardo Alemán, a columnist for the newspaper El Universal.

Marcos, the head of the barely-armed indigenous Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) which took up arms in January 1994 in the southeastern state of Chiapas, is carrying out the so-called “Other Campaign,” a peaceful nationwide tour timed to coincide with the election campaign.

The aim of Marcos’s tour, which until the incidents in Atenco had received little attention from the media, is to bring together the “true left” and marginalised groups in a common front that could achieve changes in the country through peaceful social struggle.

In the meantime, in spite of the belligerent tone of the candidates’ speeches, the more than 70 million potential voters have shown little interest in the electoral contest.

In a recent nationwide doorstep survey of 1,500 Mexicans over 18 by Mitofsky, a private polling firm, 40 percent of respondents said they would not vote, and only 62 percent knew the exact date of the elections.

Opinion polls show that Mexicans are not very enthusiastic about the election, and that abstention could be higher than 40 percent. In the elections of July 2000, voter abstention stood at 36 percent.

According to the latest polls, the front-runner is Calderón, followed closely by López Obrador. These positions contrast with those recorded just two months ago, when the leftwinger had a clear lead.

The shift in voters’ preferences is attributed by observers to an aggressive media campaign by the PAN against the PRD candidate.

Another factor is the impact on public opinion of the leftwing candidate’s attacks on President Fox, who maintains an approval rating of over 60 percent, and his refusal to participate in the first of two debates arranged between the contenders, on Apr. 25. The next debate will take place on Jun. 6, and López Obrador has said he is willing to participate.

In its recent media spots, the PRD has accused the Fox administration of corruption, and has also complained about an alleged conspiracy against López Obrador involving the media, the government, and wealthy sectors of society.

Meanwhile, the Fox administration is loudly touting its supposed achievements, as is the government of Mexico City, which was headed by López Obrador until July 2005.

The Federal Electoral Institute has called on the federal government and local authorities to curb their publicity, to avoid influencing the elections.

“For the good of all, first the poor” is the slogan of López Obrador, who has the backing of the small Workers and Convergence Parties. Calderón’s campaign theme is “So that we can live better.”

The other candidates are Roberto Madrazo of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) – which ruled Mexico from 1929 to 2000 – Patricia Mercado of the social democratic Alternative, and Roberto Campa of the New Alliance. Madrazo is outstripped by the poll favourites by 10 percentage points, and Mercado and Campa together have less than five percent of voters’ preferences.

Three hundred deputies and 128 senators will also be elected. The election is costing the state some 1.2 billion dollars, making it one of the most expensive in the world.

Forty percent of that total is handed over to the competing parties, which under Mexican law are deemed “institutions of public interest,” to help cover the costs of their campaigns. The remainder is used to organise the elections themselves and to finance the work of the electoral bodies.

The campaigns can also draw on private funds, which must not exceed the public financing allocated. Campaigning will continue until eight days before the elections.

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