MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Mexico a “full and consolidated” democracy

Mexican President Vicente Fox defended in Spain his country's “full and consolidated” democracy and citizens' trust in the institutions, despite the opposition's massive challenge to the results of the July 2 presidential election.

Fox will step down from the Mexican presidency on December first. On August 31, at the latest the Federal Electoral Tribunal must confirm if Conservative candidate Felipe Calderon from the ruling National Action Party, PAN, has effectively won as the vote count indicates or his opponent Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador who is contesting the victory alleging electoral fraud.

Lopez Obrador has insisted he is "absolutely certain that, if the recount is performed, it will be shown that we won" even when the Federal Election Institute, IFE, last July 6 announced he had received 0.58% fewer votes than Mr. Calderon.

In a lunch hosted by the governor of the northern Spanish region of Cantabria who also awarded him the Gold Medal of that autonomous community, Mr. Fox said democracy has transformed Mexico and allowed it to "look with optimism to a future it has won by its own hard toil, and which we cannot lose because it is a fundamental value".

President Fox arrived in Cantabria with his wife Marta Sahagun from Madrid, where he took part in the opening of the Ibero-American Conference on Migration and Development together will Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero.