"If they get over 45% no one will believe them""
                    Ng

GUADALAJARA, JALISCO, MEXICO
AUGUST 21, 1994

. 7h30 -I wake up at the house-cum-campaign headquarters of Mare
Robles Villasenior. candidate for Federal Deputy in the 17th District
of Jalisco. Mare, secretary-general of the University of Guadalajara
student federation. is a member of the Party of the Democratic
Revolution (PRD). The centre-left party that, it's generally
acknowledged, was fraudulently cheated out of victory in the 1988
presidential election. Accompanying me in Guadalajara is Enrique
Pilarte. International Secretary of the Young Sandinistas. Enrique end
I are representing the International Union of Socialist Youth, a
federation to which the New Democratic Youth of Canada belongs (I'm
also representing Solidarity Summer, a U.S./Canadian youth
delegation). IUSY has sent representatives to six states on this,
possibly the most important election day in Mexican history. In the
last few days. we've been informed by PRD officials in Mexico City
that the vast majority of the fraud has already occurred (on the
padron or voters' list), and that any irregularities we would see
today would be minor. In addition. just yesterday. PRD Senator
Poffirio Munoz Ledo told us that the PRI would not get over of the
votes "because if they do. no one will believe them".

. 8hOO - After a few phone calls. it's agreed that Enrique will be
pieced with the campaign of Javier Guizar. District 17 candidate of
the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and president of
the national PRI youth wing. I will be visiting polling stations with
PRD campaign workers until the afternoon, when I will be placed with a
National Action Party (PAN, centre-right) campaign in a different
district The Robles campaign is kind enough to provide me with a
translator. Javiera Pinochet, a resident of Mexico City who is a
friend of Mara's through student politics.

. 8h30 - District 17 is an urban-rural area of 186,000 voters, with
3lO casillas (polling stations), on the north end of Guadalajara. The
city of GuadalaJara is a PAN stronghold, and the PRD has little hope
of winning any seats in the area. The mood of the city according to
rny hosts, has been tense over the past two years, largely es a result
of two events. The first was a huge explosion that levelled several
city blocks. The official inquiry placed the blame on a small cooking
oil company,  but the common wisdom is that the explosion was caused
by Pemex, the government-owned oil monopoly, attempting to steal
gasoline by siphoning it from a rival company's pipeline. Many also
believe that the casualty total is much higher than the official two
dozen, and that there are still many bodies unaccounted for. The
second incident was the as yet unsoIved assassination of the city's
Archbishop several months ago.

    The first casilla we visit is in a small gymnasium in the Mercado
de Bole market district.  There is a delay in the opening of the
casilla as the PRI representative has objected to the station being
located one block outside of the section it is designed to serve. The
other two (PAN and PRD) representatives argue that the casilla has
been situated there for many years, and besides,  there are one
hundred people waiting outside to vote. The casilla president agrees
with the opposition officials, records the incident in his book, and
allows the station to open. The PRI representative strenuously
objects, and calls his superiors on his cellular phone, but voting is
allowed to proceed.

    In Mexico, people ere prevented from voting more than once by two
methods. The first is a new, high-@ech voter identification card,
containing the voter's photo, thumbprint and a hologram The second is
the application of indelible inkto the voter's right thumb; ink that
will not be removable for several days. The PRD representative
suggests that if one dries some glue on one's thumb before applying
the ink, the ink will be removable by peeling off the glue. I try it
it doesn't work. The ink has seeped through the glue, and mythumb will
be stained forthe next week.

. 10hOO - We drive to a poor suburb of Guadalajara named Mesa
Colorada. Javiera, my translator,  is a medical student and remarks on
the unsanitary conditions. She says that rabies is common among both
animals and people, and the "dirt" roads contain significant
proportions of excrement.  We drive past the sign proclaiming a
Proneaol project, the government pork-barrel campaign that brings
shoddy infrastructure to poor areas just in time for the election.

    There's a long lineup at the casilla, and pretty much everything
seems to be in order. The only problem so far has been a single
complaint that the PAN representative has been wearing a party sticker
larger than the regulations permit. A compromise is reached whereby
all party representatives will remove their logos. We return to Mara's
house for a late breakfast.

. 11 h30 -The next casilla is at a school in the suburban
neighbourhood of Villa Guadalupe, and nothing seems out of the
ordinary there. However, we also begin to hear reports that special
across the city have run out of ballots. In Mexico, there is no
advance poll. Voters who are outside their home districts on Election
Day must therefore vote at a special casilla set up in each
district. By prior agreement each special casilla has only three
hundred ballots. The rumour (later confirmed to be a national trend)
is that the government has arranged for police and soldiers to vote at
the special casillas, ensuring that they will run out of ballots
before noon.

. I 2h30 -After lunch (despite thoroughly enjoying Mexican food, it's
amazing how good Kentucky Fried Chicken can taste after eight days
away from Canada), we visit the District 14 office of IFE. the Federal
Electoral Institute. A domestic observer from the Civic Alliance. the
group coordinating the vast majority of domestic and foreign observers
for the election, tells us that although there have been no major
problems so far, in two cases, the authorities were allowing women and
"rich-looking" people to jump the queue. IFE officials report nothing
out of the ordinary.

. 13h50 - Bingo. While resting at Mara's house, a campaign worker
rushes in with the names and addresses of three people who voted at a
casilla without being on the list... and reports that three
trucks, driven by men wearing PRD jackets (which none ofthe real PRD
campaign workers had) have been spotted driving people from one
casilla to another, presumably to cast multiple votes,  a practice
known as the caroussel. The descriptions of the men and the trucks
(which had no licence plates) have been confirmed by numerous PRD and
PAN casilla representatives.

. 14h10-We rush to the regional office of the Federal Electoral
Institute (IFE), to make e formal complaint. Outside, Mara and I are
both interviewed by Radio Universidad de Guadaiajara. Inside,  we hear
confirmation of the previous reports that police had used up the
ballots at special casillas.  As of 14h17, in the city of Guadalajara,
over 3,000 citizens were reported to have been denied the vote for
some reason, primarily because their names did not appear on the
list. IFE promised to send a commission to investigate this and to get
back to us (it never did).

. 15hOO -I'm transferred to the PAN office for District 14, where I
meet the candidate, Alejandro Villasenor Tatay, a 24 year old lawyer
and buyer for his family construction firm. Alejandro speaks some
English, but one of his campaign workers, Biblane Delaye, is
relatively fluent end acts as my translator. She explains to me that
Guadalajara is a relatively affluent city by Mexican standards,  and
that its conservative end religious traditions make it fertile
territory for the PAN.

    I discuss the (admittedly minor) problems I've seen with the PAN
officials; they tell me their experiences have been similar. Alejandro
has heard reports that IFE officials bringing groups of eight to ten
voters to casillas and telling the casilla presidents that although
the people are not on the list they are still allowed to
vote. However, he hasn't seen any hard evidence of it...yet.

. 15h55-At the IFE office for District 14. Civic Alliance observer
Jaime Martinez Pacheco tells us that he's heard of exactly the same
problem. He believes it was a personal decision of the District 14 IFE
president, PAN and PRD representatives, who we meet in the building,
believe the situation is serious, so we demand and receive an
immediate meeting with the president Lic. Madano Gil y Gil.

    Lic. Gil y Gil says he doesn't have a list of people added to the
padron but that there have been 332 of them. A PAN official then
confronts him with testimony from PAN and PRD witnesses that a woman,
Anabertha Carrillo Padilia, and a man, Jorge Alejandro Hinojoso
Cervantes, have gone to at least twenty-five casillas (the PAN
representative shows a list of the casilla numbers), telling the IFE
officials there that anyone living in the section who is not on the
list may still vote. lic. Gil y Gil claims that he gave them no such
order, but confirms (after collaborating descriptions with the party
representatives' reports) that the two named individuals are in fact
District IFE officials. He tries to brush off our complaints by saying
that we can make a complaint after the election is over. The party
representatives don't give up, though, and he finally agrees to send
someone to investigate, but will not tell us who or when. Throughout
the entire meeting, a PRI representative is present, but remains
completely silent.

. 17hOO- GuadalaJara being strongly PAN, the main concern of the Iocal
PRD campaigns is ensuring thha the election will be a clean one, even
if this means helping the PAN. It is thus strange but not shocking
that Alejandro should receive a call on his cellular phone from my PRD
host Mara Robies, giving Alejandro the purported address of a District
14 centro de mapaches ("racoon centre"), a place where PRI operatives
organize the so-called taco or ballot-stuffing

 . 17h15-We go to the addres Mara has provided us, on Paseo de las
Artistas. a tiny side street.  A man wearing the uniform of a city
transit agent asks us "Are you voting? This is a dead end. We pretend
we're just passing through, and drive around the corner.  Alejandro is
convinced that this is a centro de mapaches, as there is no casilla
anywhere near the address. He calls a notary and the press, asking
them to meet him at a certain gas station.  His campaign workers get
the camcorder ready, and ask me to make sure my foreign observer's
badge is visible when we approach the house.

. 17h40- We're informed by the press that the centro de mapaches, in
fact just a poorly identified IFE office-for District 75. Somewhat
embarrassed, we abandon our hunt, which at times had had the feeling
of a really good spy movie.

. 17h50- Bibiana's husband Enrique, another of Alejandro's
volunteers, had previously mentioned to me that he'd read in a
newspaper that IFE had tested the voters' ink with several different
types of acid. As none of them had worked, everyone assumed that the
ink was in fact indelible.

    So. Enrique suggests, why not try a base? Biblane has some Alkar
Seltzer with her, as well as some Ditopax E a Maalox-like antecid made
by the pharmaceutical company Enrique's sister works for. The ink on
mythumb has already 'burned" into my skin, and can't be removed (we've
tried), so following the mapache caper, we go to a casilla to test
out the theory (another rumour going around that we thankfully never
got to test involved goat urine).

    The casilla officials ink both my index fingers, and a small
crowd gathers around as ldunk them simultaneously in one cup each of
Alka-Seltzer (in water) and Ditopax F. After rubbing my fingers in the
liquids for three or four minutes, I pull them out, perfectly dean, to
the amazement of all present. Fortunately, the polls are only open for
another five minutes. so that no one has any time to copy my feat for
fraudulent purposes, but I can't help worrying about just how easily
ldid it.


    AIejandro's campaign workers then drive me back to their campaign
office, where rm picked up by one of Mara's volunteers.

. 18h50 - Two of Mara's campaign workers drive me to the regional IFE
office (three weeks later. I'm still not sure why; I could have sworn
they told me them was a meeting there). The gates are closed; they'@
only letting IFE officials and reporters inside, and there is a crowd
of about fifty people standing outside in the rain.

    I'm told that most of them are people who haven't been able to
vote for one reason or another. Some went to special casillas which
ran out of ballots, others simply weren't on the padron. Chanting "We
want to vote", "We've been sold out'' and "We are citizens", a number
are banging on the gates, The occasional troublemaker tries to start
some pro-Zapatista chants, but they are generally ignored. There's
also the occasional street argument.

    A limousine pulls up, and a taIl man walks out. He's mobbed by
people asking him questions, but nonchalantly proceeds into the IFE
compound. At this point, I'm told that he's the United States consul
in Guadalajara. Later, the regional IFE director comes out and tries
to tell the crowd to go home. The people heckle him and demand to know
what's going on. He disappears back into the building.

    An American notices my badge and introduces himself. He's from
California, and is in Guadalajara visiting his girlfriend, who
couldn't vote because her name wasn't on the padron so he's here
demonstrating. He asks me what rye seen all day. I pull out my notes
and read them to him, in English. Some of the crowd gathers around to
hear. In broken English, they ask me to tell the Canadian press that
they won't recognize the new government, and that Canadians should
know what the Mexican government is doing to its own people. It makes
me want to cry.

. 19h45 - Backto Mara's place. There's no word on the results yet; we
hear on the radio that the session of the Jalisco IFE: council has
been suspended until 21 h30.

    We're also informed bythe District 17 IFE that due to the problem
at the Mercado de la Bola casilla, which was one block outside its
section, the results of the entire casilla have been
annulled. Evidently, the PRI representative's complaints have found a
sympathetic ear.

. 20h3D - On television, national IFE President Jorge Carpizo McGregor
announces that he's made a personal "quick count" of a sample of
results and has decided to not release the results yet,
Javiera. after translating, tells me that "something's seriously
wrong".

    The calls start coming in from District 17 casillas, all bad news
for Mara and for the PRD in general. PAN candidate Efrain Miramontes
appears to be slightly ahead of the PRI; Mara has about ten
percent. Javiera reminds me that District 17 has never had a strong
PRD vote.

. 22h05 -We get a call from my Sandinista colleague Enrique, who is at
the PRI campaign party,  and reports that his day has been relatively
quiet, visiting casillas. Like everyone else we've met today, he
mentions the problem ofthe special casillas running out of
ballots, but thinks that on the whole, he hasn't seen any evidence of
major fraud.

. 22h09-The first presidential results come in on Television
Azteca. PRI candidate Ernesto Zedillo leads with 51.8 percent. The
PAN's Diego Fernandez is second with 2zl1 percent, Cuauhtemoc Cardenas
of the PRD has 17.3 percent, and 6.8 percent goes to minor
candidates. There's no mention of legislative races. At eve;y
intermission, they show Confias en Mexico a 30 second patriotic song
played to backdrops of mountains, churches and dancing children.


. 22h20- More results come in, all with roughly the same results, but
Mara's father tells me he's just received a phone call saying that CNN
is reporting the PRD' s Cardenas in the lead (the next day,  I'm
told that he was mistaken; it was a different channel).

. 23h01 -@ Cardenas is on TV. Mara's living room, until now filled
with the sounds of people talking to casilla representatives over the
phone, kids playing, and campaign workers typing the results into
computers, goes deadly silent.

    Cardenas claims that internal PRD polls show that he's actually
winning, and he questions the moral character of the T'V networks. He
reports that there have been problems with the vote all over the
country, particularly in the states of Veracruz and Chiapas, and that
there has been unspecified "repression of citizens". He also says that
15 to 20 percent of citizens were left off the padron.

    Most of the media coverage following Cardenas' speech consists of
electoral analysis by experts, party representatives and IFE
officials. There is little mention of the actual results, and no
coverage whatsoever of the senatorial or congressional results or of a
regional breakdown of the vote. I really wish they'd stop showing
Confias en Mexico every fifteen minutes.

. 23h59 - PAN presidential candidate Fernandez holds his press
conference. He denounces the fraud that he says is rampant, but says
he will wait for the official results before either conceding or
declaring victory.

. 1 h3D - Enrique returns from the PRI party. From the vantage point
of the ruling party campaign,  he's actually seen very little, and is
somewhat surprised at the number of incidents we mention to him.

    Alejandro Villasenior drops by to visit his friend Mara. The PAN
swept the city; Mara has already conceded defeat (District 17 was
dose, but it was between the PAN and the PRI; the PAN eventually
won), and Alejandro has won a 10,000 vote victory in District 14. I
congratulate him on his achievement, which is really quite amazing
considering all the problems that have occurred. He may stand for
everything I'm opposed to, but unlike the PRI at least he fights for
his beliefs honestly.

. 2h30- Exhausted after an excruciatingly tiring day, Enrique end
I thank everyone for their hospitality, wish them all the best, and
manage to catch a few hours of well-deserved sleep before taking the
9bOO bus back to Mexico City.

AFTERWORD

    The following two incidents are typical of reports made by members
of the Solidarity Summer delegation at a meeting at the Hotel El
Ejecutivo in Mexico City, August 22. Of the dozen delegates present,
only two had not seen any major incidents. Several had been to the PRD
organized rally earlier in the day, at which Cuauhtemoc Cardenas had
further denounced the fraud:

. Merisa Vural (New York City) reported that in the state of
Morelos. PRI representatives were handing out sandwiches to people
lining up to vote. She also witnessed the same man voting three
times. PRI stickers were displayed inside a casilla; when she tried
to videotape them, people stood in front of them to block her
view. She also saw soldiers voting in uniform, which is an electoral
offence.

. Catherine Raveczky (Denver) reported that in 50 percent of 15
casillas she surveyed in the State of Mexico, there were people who
were not on the padron but somehow had credentials. The PRI
representative at one casilla was telling people how to vote. She
personally saw carousels. and many people had to show their ballots
to a PRI representative before putting them in the ballot boxes. In
addition, Pronasol equipment and materials had apparently been set up
near casillas only two weeks before election day.

    On Tuesday, August 23, the Civic Alliance held a debriefing
session for foreign observers.  The media reports to date had
generally described the reactions of foreign visitors as mild
condemnations of the way the system was "stacked" in fayour of the
PRI, but overall satisfaction that the elections had been free and
fair,  had haflfexpected this sort of reaction from such people as Joe
Clark and U.S. Senator John McCain, but was shocked to find the
following words in a press release from Ed Broadbent:

  From the point of view of the forceful participation of civil
  society, institutional reforms and transparency, yesterday's
  elections were a clear step forward for Mexican democracy.

  While the unfairness of the electoral process is regrettable, the
  presence of national observers and international witnesses and the
  determination of Mexican society to make the election democratic have
  led to the will of the majority being expressed.

Now, I do believe that the PRI would have won the election without the
fraud-no one really takes Cardones' claim that he actually won with 38
percent seriously-but Broadbent's press release, which almost seems to
say that the fraud was inconsequential, infuriated the majority of the
Canadian delegation. Even one of the people who had travelled with Ed
to Chiapas, a representative of the Quebec Native Women, condemned the
statement.

  Probably three-quarters of the foreign observers at the Civic
Alliance meeting reported some sort of major fraud. One Canadian who
had gone to Chiapas reported that she had entered a accompanied by a
PRI offidal. The casilla president offered to let her vote. She also
said she saw Guatemalans voting, and Mexico does not allow dual
citizenship.

    In fact, from what I saw, the level of credibility given to the
election by a foreign observer was in nearly direct inverse proportion
to the stature of the individual, regardless of political affiliation.
Thus, Ed Broadbent, Joe Clark, John McCain and Andres Aliamend all
gave the election the stamp of legitimacy, while ordinary observers,
generally, did not.  None of the other foreign observers seemed to
have figured out that AlkarSeltzer would remove the ink possibly a
good sign. But many were taking the Civic Alliance's buttons, that
urged Juego limpio or clean game, and wearing them upside down.

Copyright (c) 1994 by Alex E.H. Ng. All rights reserved. Permission to
cite is granted as long as credit is given and the author notified.

Alex E.H. Ng
316 McCaffrey Rd.
Newmarket. Ontario
Canada L3X 1 J1
(41 6)665-7628 (tel/fax- call first) or (905)895-7465
alexng@io.org (E-mail)