Mexico runner-up takes pseudo oath

MEXICO CITY -- A leftist opposition leader who says he was robbed of victory in a July election was sworn in as Mexico's "legitimate president" yesterday in a challenge to his conservative rival, President-elect Felipe Calderón.

Andrés Manuel López Obrador donned a red-white-and-green sash like those used by Mexico's presidents, and he promised tens of thousands of supporters that his parallel government would work for the poor.

"There are millions of Mexicans who are not willing to accept more abuses," López Obrador said in Mexico City's central Zocalo square in a ceremony that has no legal weight but could mark the start of new street protests.

Supporters chanted "president, president" as López Obrador took to the stage on a cold, windy afternoon, and a leftist senator helped him with the sash.

Ruling party candidate Calderón won the July 2 election by a razor-thin margin, and Mexico's top election court threw out López Obrador's claims of massive fraud.

The leftist crippled central Mexico City for several weeks after the election by setting up protest camps, but his campaign has since faded.

His swearing-in ceremony on the anniversary of the start of the Mexican Revolution in 1910 was an attempt to revive his left-wing movement.

Lawmakers from his Party of the Democratic Revolution have vowed to prevent Calderón from taking office in Congress Dec. 1, and López Obrador says his rival cannot rest easy.

"He knows that he didn't win, that he is the product of an electoral fraud. That can not give him peace of mind. No matter how cynical he is, he can not feel secure," López Obrador said in an interview in the La Jornada newspaper yesterday. "Calderón is the lowly servant of the white-collar criminals."

Federal police have already set up barricades around the Chamber of Deputies to prevent López Obrador's supporters from setting up new protest camps there in coming days.

The election highlighted a deep class divide in Mexico.

López Obrador follower Quetzalcoatl Garcia, 35, said little had changed since the start of the Mexican Revolution.

"We have the same conditions now as there were then: too much poverty, they don't respect your rights, health and education are restricted," said Garcia, dressed as a revolutionary with a straw sombrero hat and ammunition belts made of paper across his chest.

López Obrador campaigned for president on promises to attack poverty, end two decades of free-market reforms, and create jobs with ambitious public works programs.

In contrast, Calderón plans to continue the pro-business policies of outgoing President Vicente Fox and is likely to be a firm ally of the United States.

In the weeks after the July election, about a third of Mexicans believed López Obrador was robbed of victory, but that number has apparently declined in recent months.

A poll in the Reforma newspaper yesterday showed that 56 percent of those questioned oppose his decision to name himself "legitimate president" while just 19 percent back him.