Despite celebrating the result of a referendum called this Sunday (10) in Mexico to reaffirm his power, President Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador had his “victory” at the polls clouded by low turnout.
According to a quick calculation carried out by the National Electoral Institute (INE), between 90.3% and 91.9% voted for AMLO, as the president is known, to remain in office until the end of his term in 2024. The participation rate , however, was between 17% and 18.2%.
In practice, low voter turnout invalidates the result. For it to be considered valid and binding, more than 40% of Mexicans would have to vote for or against the president. However, as voting is not mandatory, abstention was even higher than predicted by polls.
Thus, even if the majority of voters had voted for him to leave office, the president would not be obliged to abide by the result.
In a video posted on his social media, AMLO said that “Mexicans have made history again”, but ruled out the possibility of using the referendum result to press for a constitutional reform that allows his re-election.
“I’m not going to do it because I’m a Democrat and I’m not in favor of reelection. We’re going to finish the work of transformation,” said the president, referring to a series of projects that require constitutional reforms for which he does not have a parliamentary majority.
López Obrador, however, accuses the INE of sabotage for having allegedly reduced the disclosure of the referendum in complicity with the opposition. The president of the organ defended himself against the accusation, classifying it as “categorically false”.
AMLO himself annulled his vote and tried to be impartial in relation to his own destiny in the Presidency by writing on the ballot the words “Viva Zapata!” in reference to the Mexican revolutionary leader.
“We don’t have a king in Mexico, there is no oligarchy. It is a democracy in which the people put in and the people take away”, said the president in his speech celebrating the results.
The recall referendum has been in the Constitution since 2019 — when it was proposed by López Obrador himself as a kind of antidote against bad governments — but it is not mandatory and had never been used.
In calling this Sunday’s referendum, AMLO tried to repeat the formula he usually resorts to when he doesn’t get enough support in Congress to pass his main reforms. In general, he calls for plebiscites, whose results, which are generally positive, even with low participation, serve to build the president’s figure as an interpreter of the popular voice.
For opponents, who advocated abstention, the referendum was an act of propaganda. “It will be marked by illegality, lies, manipulation and embezzlement of public resources,” said Marko Cortés, of the conservative National Action Party (PAN, the second largest party in Congress).
“It may have been a historic exercise, but the government turned it into a mockery to satisfy its own ego and continue to deceive Mexicans,” said Alejandro Moreno, leader of the PRI, an acronym that has dominated Mexican politics for decades.
