Mexico - August 13, 2000 (Press Release Network): The strength of the public structure and the willfulness of the people to participate in the full execution of their political rights resulted in the most competitive elections in the history of Mexico the 2nd of July 2000, and allowed the country to take a big step forward in the transition process towards democracy.

The Elections 2nd of July

Nevertheless, the transition is not completed, and the election process was not neat in all respects or in all states of the Republic. If the old tactics in election manipulation, such as pregnant ballot boxes (when the box contains votes illegally completed before the election begins), mad mice (one person is voting in different voting premises), merry-go-rounds (buying of votes by switching voting ballots), the shaved (voters are not registered even though they have voting identification cards) and so-called “computer system breakdowns” etc. have almost disappeared from the election folklore, then you cannot say the same about the modernized tactics of buying votes, voter coercion, manipulation and conditioning of social programs such as PROGRESA and PROCAMPO, tactics that when used in the entire country, created a strong impact in the most deprived zones, such as the state of Chiapas.

Even more concerning in Chiapas, together with the vote buying and voter coercion, most of the traditional dirty election practices survived, such as violation of the right to vote secretly, induction of votes, the presence of other people in voting premises near voting booths and ballot boxes, threats to election observers and deficient handling of the election documentation by civil servants in the election premises. In the same way there were irregularities which could be blamed not as much on bad will, than on a lack of electoral and political knowledge among the voters and election civil servants. In several places, it was reported that people weren’t allowed to vote because they were not registered, which is not to be blamed as much on the shaved practice (see above), but more on confusion between special and extraordinary voting premises, a situation often seen in camps of displaced people. A novelty in numerous election premises was that the voter identification cards were perforated not in the place corresponding to the federal elections, but in the place for state elections, which are still to be held. It is the fear that this was a result of something worse than lack of knowledge of the election civil servants, as this practice seems to have been constant and widespread. Just in the town of Chilón, 900 cases were recorded. (Latest news: The organization Yomlej has just reported that they have received official information from both Consejo Estatal Electoral (The State Electoral Council) and the Local Executive Committee of IFE (Instituto Federal Electoral, Federal Election Institute) that they have agreed to resolve this problem).

When it comes to the mechanisms of buying and coercion of votes, it should be mentioned that in Chiapas it came to such a magnitude and nerve that during the PRI (Partido Revolucionario Institucional, The Institutional Revolution Party) internal process for selecting the candidate for the presidency, the PRI members themselves reported to the provisory governor Roberto Albores the illegitimate use of public resources. As expected, this situation got worse during the federal election process. The monetary benefits of official programs such as PROGRESA and PROCAMPO were conditionally given for the political votes of the beneficiaries; furthermore the voting cards were gathered as a requirement to progress the programs. Fines were applied for not attending meetings for the PRI candidate and PRI members threatened expulsion of opposers not voting for the PRI candidate.

The Situation in the State of Chiapas Just Before the Governor Elections

In this year, the election processes in the state of Chiapas take place in a situation that is far from the most adequate for exercising the right to vote. An extensive and dense militarization, the persistence of the paramilitary groupings, their unpunished actions and the consistent existence of thousands of displaced people are conditions that obstruct the execution of the fundamental rights of the people. The constant intimidation that comes from continually being surrounded by armed persons from official or unofficial forces creates a climate of fear in the communities, which makes it difficult or even impossible to exercise free expression of ideas, liberty to gather and individual rights. Without these conditions you cannot claim that the exercising of a right as crucial as electing authorities is free. It is true that the Mexican Army offered - and fulfilled - to withdraw the reserves during the Election Day, the 2nd of July, in order not to obstruct the free movement of the citizens (with this, it is implicitly recognized that the free movement is normally blocked). But this isolated offer can hardly compensate for a permanent situation in which the attitudes, the fear and the forced compromises of the people continue.

On top of this situation of conflict which hasn’t been resolved in spite of what the authorities´ propaganda is stating, is added a series of events of violence which has occurred in the present year and which, only with great difficulty, can be considered as mere coincidences. Included among the factors of this tension are: the military advancement around the communities in the Lacandon Jungle, the threats to clear several of these communities using ecological pretexts, the ambushes en El Bosque in February and June this year and in Chenalho (near Pantelho) in May. It is necessary to remember that the authorities in the last two ambushes have tried to blame the responsibility for these ambushes on the indigenous Zapatistas using arguments with very dubious judicial value, which they exposed their political motivations and the obvious intention of breaking loose a prosecution of the Zapatista communities. More recently reports have been made of a violent clearing and detention of around 70 persons in San Felipe Ecatepec (municipal of San Cristobal), who were protesting against the damages on their community caused by the construction of a new road. Finally we have the last acts of violence in Yajalón which can be connected with a situation of increasing tension in the Northern Zone of the State, where the paramilitary group Paz y Justicia (Peace and Justice) has been operating unpunished during at least the last four years, with the motive of creating a dispute over the land. They have attacked the community Tierra y Libertad, burned down the houses and forced the population to flee into the mountains.

A pattern can be seen in the events of violence in Chiapas, which has been announced several times by the now non-existent CONAI (Comision Nacional de Intermediacion, National Commission for Intermediation), that the violence is induced and provoked in the communities, with the purpose of getting political or military control. As a numerous group of non-governmental organizations, during this year we have announced and alerted the public that the events of violence mentioned above could support a strategy of intimidation in order to suppress the peoples´ participation in the elections. The probability of this hypothesis is supported by the fact that in the last federal election the districts with the highest percentage of abstention coincided with the regions which have registered a high degree of political violence and these are at the same time districts in which PRI obtained favorable results.

It should be mentioned that while in the rest of the country the level of participation of the people was wide and active, then in Chiapas the abstention reached a percentage around 50. This also resulted in the announced triumph of PRI the 2nd of July. Even though it is true that the PRI obtained the majority of the votes ahead of a number of opposing parties, the obtained votes only represent around 22% of the electorate due to the high abstention. It is clear that this incomplete representation in the future also could affect the opposing alliance. This fact together with the previous mentioned signals indicate without any doubt, that the conditions for a true democratic exercise of the right to vote are given only with difficulties in Chiapas. If a true democratic advancement is to be seen, then it will not be thanks to, but in spite of, the existing conditions in the state. Whoever of the candidates wins has to take into account that the elections hardly can be considered a step towards a normalization of the political institutional life in Chiapas. The pending tasks are numerous and follow what has been established in the Law for Dialog and Conciliation, a law which the current state and federal administrations have preferred to ignore completely: through “dialog and conciliation....to deal with the cases that create the conflict (initiated 1st of January 1994) and promote a consensus of solutions”. It is evident that this law requires the recognition of the first stage of the San Andrés Agreements and a reinitiation of the peace negotiations process.

Attempt of the Political Manipulation of Religion.

It should be recognized that the campaigns for the governorship of Chiapas in general have been on a higher level than the presidential campaign, in which the candidates often used insults and personal disqualification. Even though, these low punches have not been totally absent in Chiapas. It should be mentioned that the recently started campaign is using the name of the Catholic religion against the candidate of Alianza por Chiapas (Alliance for Chiapas), who is known as an evangelist. Lately in various media, anonymous announcements have circulated begging the Catholics “to defend their faith” (sic) by voting for “the Catholic Sami David David” (sic) and not for “the evangelist Pablo Salazar Mendicuchia”. It is evident that the motivation is more political than religious in this campaign (Sami David has just publicly declared that he does not profess to any religion) and is even more serious, as it intends to burst open in all of Chiapas a process similar to the one in San Juan Chamula, where the religion is manipulated with the purpose of political control, and has resulted in one of the spots with the most serious and persistent systematical violations of human rights. This situation which several times has been announced by non-governmental organizations is tolerated by the state authorities, who are the alleged beneficiaries of the current campaign of achieving a goal of equating PRI with Catholicism, a strange identification. The priest from different sides will do right in not being involved in this rough manipulation, and instead alert their parish members about the unproper manipulation of faith for political purposes.

As for the Consejo Estatal Electoral (State Election Council) it remains to be seen if they will achieve the role which the IFE (Instituto Federal Electoral, Federal Election Institute) played in the federal elections. Until now, a few days before the elections, people have not yet received the creditation for observing the elections in spite of the fact that they have filled in forms, taken part in workshops and fulfilled all requirements in time and form.

Approaching the electoral process, the 20th of August, we, the below signing organizations, express our worries with both the specific political-electoral irregularities and with the events of violence, which are seen in different regions of the state. We demand that the electoral institutions fulfill their tasks ethically and professionally in order to guarantee a clean up of the electoral process. We plea to the various municipal, state and federal authorities to act within their areas of power in order to guarantee conditions of at least a minimum of respect for human rights and the right to vote. From the authorities of the judicial powers we demand that the prosecution of the real illegal incidences, reported in the state of Chiapas, will not be used as a pretext to act more politically than judicially and which would result in a state of justice more vulnerable than strengthened.

Finally we plea to the people not to compromise their vote for threats or lies and to get informed in order to secure that the free, secret and well-considered vote will go to a candidate who corresponds to the necessities of the people.