Can you feel the excitement? A hat tip to AnimalPolitico.com For a map, click here
By Chris Covert
Mexico's national body that regulates elections will vote Friday on a proposed schedule for the 2012 national elections, according to Mexican news accounts.
The Instituto Federal Electoral (IFE) will cast the vote without two of its board members.
The 2012 elections will select the president and federal deputies.
The proposed national election schedule is as follows:
- November 18th is the deadline for coalition agreements among political parties to be submitted.
- December 19th is the last day political parties may define how their candidate selection process will go.
- December 18th, 2011 thru February 15th, 2012 is the designated campaign time period for primary elections campaigns.
- February 16th, 2012 thru February 22nd is the time period for the primaries, if any.
- March 1st, 2012 thru March 7th: IFE will deal with internal problems within each political party as they rise.
- March 15th, 2012 thru March 29th is the registration period for all candidates.
- March 30th,2012 thru June 27th is the active campaign season.
- July 1st is election day.
Mexican elections at all levels are tightly controlled and regulated events, with rules governing how money is spent as well as how much, and what candidates may and may not say. Rules even apply outside the defined time limits as set forth.
Currently, the three main Mexican political parties have winnowed down their fields to a few candidates.
The Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) has three top contenders.
- The telegenic Enriqie Pena Nieto, former governor of Mexico state, is considered the favored candidate to become Mexico's next president.
- Manlio Fabio Beltrones Rivera is a former governor of Sonora and currently a senator.
- Beatriz Parades Rangel, former leader of the PRI who stepped down last spring in favor of Humberto Moreira. She holds the stunning achievement of holding or flipping 14 of 16 statehouses in 2012 during her tenure as leader.
The Partido Accion Nacional (PAN) also has three top contenders.
- Josefina Vasquez Mota is an economist and a Nuevo Leon federal deputy. She has held several posts within the Calderon government and is known as something of a utility player, who Calderon can call on to fix political matters. Vasquez is currently the frontrunner, judging by public polls.
- Santiago Creel Miranda is a senator from Chihuahua state who formerly held the post of Minister of the Interior (SEGOB) under president Vicente Fox. He ran unsuccessfully for president in 2005. Creel Miranda is from one of Mexico's wealthiest familes. He is also related to Gustavo Madero Muñoz, who is president of PAN and who is also a senator from Chihuahua state.
- Manuel Espino Barrientos is a deputy from Sonora state who has held several government posts at the local and state level. News reports say he had been expelled from PAN and may not run under the PAN banner. However, Manuel Espino Barrientos claimed to have support of most of the registered members of PAN to run as a Panista.
The Partido Revolucion Democratica (PRD) is Mexico's mainstream leftist party, organized to encompass Mexico's large communist and socialist constituency. Many of its top leaders were members of communist organizations who suffered at the hands of successive PRI presidents during the Dirty War (1968-1982). Currently PRD has two top contenders.
- Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, is founder and titular leader of the PRD. Lopez Obrador, nationally known by his initials AMLO, ran an ultimately unsuccessful campaign against current president Felipe Calderon in 2006, losing by less than one percent of the vote. AMLO is popular both inside and outside of the PRD. His views tend to attract many of PRI's natural constituents.
- Marcelo Luis Ebrard Casaubon is AMLO's nearest rival. He is even more popular within PRD than AMLO, but a virtual unknown nationally. He is currently head of government of the Distrito Federal.