Voters go to the polls Sunday, June 7 in local and midterm national elections amid tight security following protests this week organized by radical teachers and other citizen groups that led to the burning and blockading of National Electoral Institute (INE) offices in the states of Oaxaca, Veracruz and Guerrero.
The elections will bring in 500 new federal deputies, nine governors, 17 state legislatures and 900 mayors.
Voters in Jalisco will elect 125 mayors, 19 federal legislators and 39 new members of the State Congress (19 by direct election and 20 by proportional representation).
Electoral authorities say 38,923 polling booths will be set up in the state with parties permitted to have their own representatives at each one to monitor the voting process. The PRI will have the most extensive coverage, having registered 35,173 representatives with the INE, giving the party a 90-percent presence at state polling stations. The MC, reportedly, will have only 24,147 representatives monitoring polling stations on election day, giving it 62-percent coverage.
The official end of the campaign kicked in Thursday, June 4, starting a three-day period during which parties, candidates, authorities and the media (including this newspaper) are forbidden from disseminating information or advertising that might influence the election’s outcome.
“This will be a period of reflection among citizens, when people think about the information they have obtained during the campaign and decide who to support,” said Guillermo Alcaraz Cross, president of Jalisco’s Electoral Institute. “Candidates will be forbidden from promoting their image, their proposals or their platforms in any way.”
The metropolitan area and municipalities across Jalisco saw a flurry of activity this week as candidates closed their campaigns with stirring public rallies. 
One of the tightest – and most closely watched – races this year is in Guadalajara, where Citizen’s Movement (MC) candidate Enrique Alfaro hopes to defeat Ricardo Villanueva of the of Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and end decades of two-party rule.
But the race for Guadalajara mayor was thrown into confusion after the Jalisco Electoral Institute last weekend ruled that famed clown Lagrimita (Guillermo Cienfuegos) will be able to stand as an independent candidate after he was unfairly dismissed from the ballot several months ago. The process of reprinting the ballots is set to cost 2.5 million pesos (US$161,000). The performer had only one full day of campaigning and worked his current circus show into a final campaign rally. He has already announced his plans to challenge the results.
Thousands of volunteers will supervise the voting process and serve as vote counters. They are ordinary citizens without obvious political affiliations, mostly chosen at random in the neighborhoods where polling stations are set up. They receive a short training course prior to the elections and are not paid for their trouble (they do, however, receive a meal stipend on election day).
Eligible voters must turn up to cast their votes between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. As in past elections, it is inevitable that a small percentage will be denied the chance to vote, either because their names do not appear for some reason on the electoral roll, or their credentials are deemed “irregular” or out of date. Thumbs will be will inked as one way of preventing multiple voting.
Meanwhile, this week INE organized its third and final electoral simulation. INE President Lorenzo Cordova said the protests by disgruntled civic groups probably represent the biggest threat to the smooth running of the elections, even more than the drug cartel violence that has recently flared up in Jalisco.
Nonetheless, Jalisco authorities are leaving nothing to chance and have instigated a special operation over the weekend that puts all security agencies in the state under a centralized command, as well as officers on heightened alert for any sign of any disturbance.
Jesus Lomeli Rosas, general secretary at Guadalajara City Hall, promised a high degree of cooperation between state and federal agencies, as security forces aim to “conserve peace and calm, avoid disorder and provide support to the electoral authority.”
INE’s Cordova said Mexico’s current electoral system is without doubt the “most robust” in the country’s history. He also explained that results from the “preliminary vote count” (Prep) will be released from 11 p.m. on Sunday, June 7. Definitive results will not be confirmed until Tuesday at the earliest.
As they are collated, results will be posted on INE’s website at ine.com.mx.
And as results come in, supporters of many victorious mayoral candidates will celebrate by driving through the streets, honking their horns and waving flags. Some of the newly elected mayors will hold victory parties to thank their supporters.