By Alistair Bell
MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexico's left, still smarting from a 1988 presidential vote it says was stolen from it, simmered with anger on Monday as its dreams of power were frustrated by another contested election.
Conservative candidate Felipe Calderon claimed victory in Sunday's hard-fought presidential election and official returns appeared to show anti-poverty campaigner Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador would be unable to catch him.
Harvard-educated Calderon held a one-point lead over former Indian welfare officer Lopez Obrador on Monday with returns in from almost 98 percent of polling stations. A top electoral official said a recount this week was unlikely to change that.
Leaders of the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution, or PRD, were to meet Lopez Obrador to try to rescue his attempt to become president and join the ranks of leftist leaders in Latin America.
A tiny group of defiant Lopez Obrador supporters gathered outside his campaign headquarters. Many said their candidate, the former mayor of Mexico City, had been cheated of victory by fraud. "He won more points that Calderon," said retired factory worker Arturo Jimenez, 74.
"He lost, but unfairly. There was sleight of hand involved," said office cleaner Carmen Sanchez.
No candidate has claimed to have evidence of vote-rigging in the election, which the Federal Electoral Institute said was too close to call yet.
'SLEIGHT OF HAND'
But the PRD may point to irregularities, like some polling stations that lacked ballot papers, in a bid to take the result to an electoral court. That could delay the naming of a winner for two months.
No leftist party has ever won the presidency in Mexico. Left-wing candidate Cuauhtemoc Cardenas came very close in 1988, when results showed him ahead on election night.
But the Institutional Revolutionary Party government halted the vote count, claiming "the (computer) system went down."
That explanation was believed by so few that it has become a common sarcastic phrase in Mexico for the lamest of excuses.
When the government announced the system was back again a few hours later, its candidate Carlos Salinas was winning. Fraud was widely suspected.
"They robbed us in 1988. I don't want that again," said Sanchez. She said she felt "hurt and anger" when electoral authorities announced on Sunday night the race between Lopez Obrador and Calderon was too close to call,
Lopez Obrador, 52, a frugal widower, has led in opinion polls for most of the last three years.
He slipped briefly into second place in April and May when Calderon's team launched TV ads dubbing him a danger to Mexico and a populist like Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
He said on Monday he would accept defeat if there were no fraud but challenge the result if he suspected trickery.
Foreign investors fear Lopez Obrador will launch street protests to try to push his election claim, triggering political gridlock and maybe even violence.
Mexico City was quiet on Monday, except for a small student protest outside the electoral authority's office.
Emilio Serrano, a PRD federal deputy, warned that things could still turn nasty depending on the vote recount.
"The majority of poor and simple people who are sick of all this are capable of anything," he said, "including violence."
__________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com