The leftist claiming fraud in Mexico's presidential election two weeks ago was to face a test of his strength yesterday when he led a huge rally through the capital in support of his call for a vote recount.
Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who pulled a crowd of 100,000 protesters last weekend, hopes for an even bigger demonstration of support at a march through the city's main Reforma avenue.
The nation's political left has called for supporters from all 32 states to converge on the capital for the demonstration.
Lopez Obrador, 52, is trying to put pressure on an election court that will rule on his charge that conservative Felipe Calderon, the government and electoral officials stole the presidency from him through fraud.
Calderon came from behind in opinion polls to win the July 2 election by a fraction of a percentage point. The court must rule by early September on who actually won the vote, which split the nation between right and left only six years after President Vicente Fox ended 71 years of single-party rule.
Officials from Lopez Obrador's Party of the Democratic Revolution have told the Mexican media they expect up to half a million people on the march.
Protesters will walk past the US Embassy, international hotels and a business district before holding a mass rally in the Zocalo square, once the center of the Aztec world and now home to the National Palace seat of government and the city's Spanish colonial cathedral.
The square, one of the largest in the world, has become the focus of protests to back Lopez Obrador, who was the capital's popular mayor until quitting last year to run for president.
"We'll move in and live here if need be," said leftist Juan Carlos Escandon, gathering signatures in favor of Lopez Obrador in the Zocalo.
"The Mexican Constitution says sovereignty rests with the people, not the courts, and we are the people," he said.
Tens of thousands of leftists have streamed into the capital in the last few days from around the country, some walking, others on buses and even a few on horseback but the city was quiet on Saturday evening as a downpour, common in the tropical rainy season, lashed the streets.
About 6,000 supporters of Lopez Obrador have set up camp in the capital, a top city official said.
The number of demonstrators traveling from across the country was likely to swell overnight ahead of the event, said Ricardo Ruiz, a top Mexico City official.
Officials set up a camp for them in a public plaza near the city's historic center, with emergency personnel and police on hand in case they were needed, he said.
A large banner hanging over the main road to Mexico City airport had a picture of Harvard-educated Calderon with the words, "This idiot is making fun of Mexico."
But despite Lopez Obrador's ability to put his supporters on the streets, a poll in the Reforma daily on Saturday showed most Mexicans do not agree with his call for a recount.
He has asked the electoral court to carry out a vote-for-vote recount, beyond the original count and the tally sheet recount last week that showed Calderon the winner.
Sixty percent of people polled by Reforma said they did not want a new recount, compared with 37 percent who backed Lopez Obrador's proposal.
But the question that was put to interviewees in the poll did not mention the allegations of fraud. It only asked if the votes should be counted a third time.
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