Mexico vote locked in a tense tie

MEXICO CITY -- Mexico's presidential election was too close to call this morning, after yesterday's nationwide vote produced what electoral officials declared a dead heat between a leftist crusader for the poor and the conservative ruling party's candidate.

The independent federal electoral institute urged calm among candidates and their followers last night, saying a result would be announced Wednesday. According to citizen counts of 54 percent of ballots cast, Felipe Calderón, 43, the conservative former energy minister, was leading Andrés Manuel López Obrador, 52, the leftist former mayor of Mexico City, by 38 percent to 36 percent.

The two men represent divergent visions for the nation's future: one focused on alleviating poverty and the other determined to stay the free-market course.

Last night, tens of thousands of supporters of the two braved heavy rain in the capital to wave banners in their party colors and cheer on their candidates, both of whom declared victory, but urged patience.

The mood was dejected around midnight in the capital's historic Zócalo plaza, where López Obrador loyalists were huddled under umbrellas, with some charging fraud. López Obrador was the race's longtime front-runner until a negative campaign by Calderón supporters robbed him of a clear lead in April.

``We will defend our victory," López Obrador vowed in a speech to supporters. ``I want the Mexican people to know that our figures show we won."

Roberto Madrazo, the candidate of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, whose 71-year-long vise grip on national politics was broken with the election of Vicente Fox as president in 2000, was running third in preliminary counts with 20 percent.

Fox cannot stand for reelection but supported his fellow party member Calderón. He appealed for calm this morning amid fears that the unknown result would raise the potential for violence.

In only the second truly democratic election in Mexico's history, voters from dilapidated shantytowns, working-class apartment blocks, and wealthy tree-lined avenues went to the polls divided over how best to spur growth.

Nearly half of Mexico's more than 100 million people live on less than $131 a month, according to a government study last year. But the candidates differed on how to address persistent poverty that has marred economic stabilization.

In the affluent Polanco district of the capital, on a tree-lined street of stately homes just blocks from pricey designer boutiques, all but one voter interviewed -- a maid who lives with her employers -- said they would vote for Calderón because they did not understand how López Obrador could finance his ambitious programs.

``Populist programs could bring inflation and economic crisis. Social programs should come through economic growth, not out of the sky," said Luis Arce, 57, owner of an investment bank and financial services company.

A mere 20 minutes' drive away, Luisa Espina, 40, an illiterate indigenous woman who moved to the capital from rural Oaxaca a decade ago, says she has seen no improvement in the economy nor any credit extended to the very poor. In the Hornos squatters' encampment ringed by fetid open garbage dumps, she and her family live in a shack without plumbing built from wooden scraps, corrugated metal, and plastic tarpaulins. She earns $109 a month as a part-time maid, to supplement her husband's $136 salary as a watchman.

They were voting for López Obrador in the hopes that his government would offer subsidized building materials and affordable plots of land. ``We don't want charity, we'd pay for it," she said, "but the way things are now, we can't afford anything."

López Obrador of the Party of the Democratic Revolution, or PRD, wants to extend social programs and promised infrastructure projects and investment in the state petroleum sector. He vowed to save $10 billion by slashing bureaucracy and top state salaries and by going after tax evaders.

Calderón, of the ruling National Action Party, or PAN, has touted free trade and private investment as the only way to spur employment and raise income. He vowed to keep inflation, debt, and interest rates low, and extend credit to lift the poor into the middle class.

In one of the many lower-middle class barrios that were perhaps the critical battlegrounds in yesterday's election, the populace seemed divided between the two men.

``I'm obviously with López Obrador, because he's a man of the people, the others aren't - they're rich and their relatives have benefited from their political posts," said Sergio Velázquez Trejo, 32, a plumber in Lomas de Becerra. ``He's the only one who's done public works, who's helped the poor, who's not corrupt."

Imelda Mejía, 35, a housewife, said she would probably vote for Calderón because she believed that López Obrador was deaf to critics, and could have an authoritarian streak.

Blocks away in a working-class neighborhood called Urban Development, María de Lourdes Solís Martínez, 43, who works 15 hours a day as a taco seller, was confident López Obrador would win. When he was mayor, she petitioned for more security against rising crime, and he dispatched federal police to the district.

But despite the good will she feels for him today, she said if he failed to make good on his promises, the people would unite to demand his resignation. "We have to teach politicians they can't ignore the people," she said.