Eeewww… abstention in Oaxaca nearly 80% (UPDATE)

UPDATED MONDAY AM)

Oaxaca is reported to have had a “quiet” election. So far, PRI is receiving slightly less than half of those votes. Well, yeah… ballots were burned in La Ventosa and a reporter shot in Salina Cruz, which counts as an incident free election in that state. IEEO (Instituto Estatal Electoral de Oaxaca) early results show that only about 12 to 13% about 20% of the voters bothered to show up for the Legislative Elections.

PRI State Executive Committee spokesman Heliodoro Díaz Escárraga, argued that the low abstention rate was not meaningful saying “it’s not that people didn’t vote, it’s that those who did voted peacably” that was the mark of success. Preliminary results show PRI winning every one of the 25 directly elected Legislative seats.

Results posted Monday at 8 AM show PRI with 47.6%; “Benefit of All” (PRD-PT-Convengencia) with 27.5%; and PAN with 13%. I’m expecting the “usos y costumbres” votes will be mostly PRI votes. The State Legislature will probably have a few more PAN and PRD-PT-Convergencia proportionally selected delegates, but the home of Benito Juarez seems to have given up on electoral politics for now..

The Baja California IEE reports a 30-35% turnout. Both PRI gubernatorial candidate Jorge Hank and PAN’s José Osuna claim to have won. Most local papers are reporting Osuna won by anywhere between 4 and 10 percent.

The only surprise was in Aguascalientes. The Bajio state is ground zero for PAN, but it only appears to have won 5 of the 17 Legislative seats, with PRI taking the rest. Turnout here was about 45%

In what may be significant, several out of state members of the SNTE (the Teachers’ Union, headed by Esther Elba Gordilla, the “Señora Hoffa” of Mexican labor and former PRI Central Committee member, whose broke away to start her own party — PANAL) were detained for illegally trying to vote in Baja Calfornia. In BC, PANAL was part of PAN’s fusion ticket, though the PRI Executive Committee is considering whether or not to allow PANAL candidates to stand with PRI in future state elections.