Candidate of the ruling party in Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, is the winner of yesterday's presidential elections of choice, exit polls show.
Scheinbaum (61) received 57,8 percent of the vote, and her closest opponent, center-right Senator Chochitl Galvez, 29,1 percent, according to a survey by the Encol Institute. In third place is the candidate of the center, Alvarez Maynez, with 11,4 percent of the votes, according to the same poll, reports portal Index.hr.
The head of the ruling Morena party, Mario Delgado, told supporters in Mexico City that Scheinbaum had won by a wide margin. Scheinbaum, a climatologist and former mayor of Mexico City, is a longtime ally of current left-populist President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who is barred from running for re-election after six years in office.
Care for democracy
She dismissed opposition claims that she would be Lopez Obrador's "puppet," though she vowed to continue many of his policies, including those that helped the poorest Mexicans.
Almost 100 million Mexicans had the right to vote in the elections, when they also voted for the mayor of the capital, eight governorships, both houses of parliament and a number of other regional and local offices.
The biggest election ever held in Mexico was also the most violent in modern history, with 38 candidates murdered. The violence has fueled concerns about the democracy of the warring drug cartels.
Yesterday, two people died at the polling stations in the state of Puebla. A Scheinbaum victory would be a big step for Mexico, a country known for its macho culture. The winner is scheduled to begin a six-year term on October 1.
