by Daniela Mohor

While Mexican presidential candidates are slinging mud, front-runner Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and his two challengers, Santiago Creel Miranda and Jesus Silva Herzog, have been leading a cleaner and more issue-driven campaign for the second most powerful position in the country: mayor of the world’s third most populous city.

International press coverage, which has been focused on Mexico’s most competitive presidential election in the past 70 years, has downplayed the mayoral race. But the July 2 balloting in the capital will in many ways place an important burden on Mexico’s political life. Not only has Mexico City always been powerful in the country, but it could also play an unexpected role by influencing the presidential election. Despite the candidates’ effort to lead a race as clean as possible, there are still rumors of political deal making in the city.

Mayor’s job: a stepping stone.

Becoming mayor is a way for politicians to prove their effectiveness in addressing citizens’ daily issues and climb towards higher office in any country. But ruling one of the world’s biggest metropolises is a difficult task

Since Cuauhtemoc Cardenas Solorzano, the last elected mayor, lost his popularity, it became clear that failing to meet people’s expectations in this city can endanger a whole political career. Mexico City’s population blames Cardenas for not addressing quality-of-life issues, and putting his political ambition ahead of his commitment to the city. Cardenas quit his mayoral position last October to run for the presidency

To garner the support of the beleaguered inhabitants of Mexico City, the mayoral candidates know that they must now distance themselves from partisan attacks and pay specific attention to citizens’ needs.

"We have to stop with this culture of rupture every six years," said Santiago Creel, a politician appreciated for his integrity and the candidate for the right-wing National Action Party (PAN), during a breakfast rally about education last March. "We have to achieve improvements and it’s always good to do it by keeping those good things from the past and getting rid of the bad ones. We can’t rule Mexico City according to the parties anymore, we have to look at the citizens’ interests."

With a population of 22 million, Mexico City and its environs account for almost a quarter of Mexico’s population. High crime rate, police corruption, one of the worst cases of air pollution on the planet, uncontrolled demographic growth and unequal distribution of public resources are some of the main issues affecting the chaotic capital.

In Iztapalapa, the city’s largest district, the population reaches 2 million people but the municipality receives less than 2 per cent of the city’s budget. This poor area, that some call the "big dorm of Mexico City", receives many migrants from the rest of the country and those inhabitants who have been evicted by development in downtown Mexico City.

In this district and others, the population growth has led to problems in the water supply. The increasing number of people settling in the city keeps the underground water supply from being refilled. As a result, some sectors of Iztapalapa have running water only every other day.

"The problem of the city is the lack of public services, " said Marcelo Ebrard, a mayoral candidate for the Center Democratic Party who withdrew his candidacy to endorse the leftist, Lopez Obrador. "There is a big fiscal crisis in the city, so the problem is much deeper than mismanaging services."

This year the new mayor will face an additional challenge. For the first time in Mexican history, the delegates for the city’s 16 districts will be directly elected by the people instead of being appointed by the mayor. Although the implementation of this electoral reform is seen as a significant step in Mexico’s process of democratization, it might make the city harder to rule.

"No matter who is elected next July 2, the already complex problems of the city will get all the more complicated as the composition of the delegates is likely to be plural," said Silva Herzog, the candidate for the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). "The governability of Mexico City will become more complicated."

But candidates for mayor and for delegates are confident that this election will force the divided political classes to work with each other.

"I don’t think the city will become ungovernable," said Margarita Saldaña Hernández, a representative of the PAN in the Federal District Legislative Assembly and a candidate for delegate. "The mayor will have the obligation to discuss and see what each one of the districts really need, and to build the agenda according to that."

Mexico City: a decisive precinct in this year’s multiple vote.

In 1997, Cuauhtemoc Cardenas Solorzano, founder of the PRD, was elected mayor of Mexico City. That same year his party, united with other opposition forces, managed to gain the majority of the seats in Congress. The victory of the opposition in both the mayoral and legislative elections put an end to the monopoly of the ruling PRI on political life and introduced a taste of pluralism in Mexico. Since then Mexico City has evolved into what many consider to be the political laboratory for the whole country in its learning process of democratization.

"Almost everything that happens in Mexico City has a national impact," said Rene Arce Islas, a representative of the center-of-left Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) in the Federal District Legislative Assembly and a candidate for delegate in Iztapalapa. "Firstly because this city produces a quarter of the national wealth, secondly because the city’s problems have a permanent resonance. Here are located the three powers -- the House of Representatives and the Senate, the presidency and the judicial branch -- so all the issues have a national impact."

Mexico City: a stake for the PRD.

Because of the city’s prominence on Mexico’s political scene and the collapse of Cardenas’ third presidential bid, it becomes especially important for the PRD to maintain its stronghold in the capital.

"The city is key," said PRD Representative Arce. "It’s very important for the life of the PRD to keep it. Losing the city would imply a regression of the left in this country."

But the PRD’s chances to keep its position in Mexico City have been challenged. Lopez Obrador -- the former PRD National Committee President and an active opposition figure in the state of Tabasco in the Gulf Coast -- was leading in the polls, when the PRI and two other parties contested his candidacy. On April 15, they filed a lawsuit arguing that Lopez Obrador had not lived in the city for five years as required by federal law.

The dispute, which an electoral tribunal will decide in the mid-May, has added uncertainty to the tight mayoral race. Before his credentials were questioned, Lopez Obrador held a 31 percent to 27 percent lead over Silva Herzog, and Creel followed with 25 percent of the voters polled by the newspaper Reforma. But if Lopez Obrador is disqualified, the situation is likely to change because the PRD has no other strong candidate to offer.

Behind the scenes: political negotiations.

However, the legal battle affecting the charismatic Lopez Obrador is not the only source of electoral uncertainty in a country used to political maneuverings.

Although the city’s electorate is considered to be more informed and political savvy than the rest of the country, some observers say voters won’t be the only factor in deciding the outcome of the election.

To Jorge Castañeda, a well-known political analyst and advisor to the PAN presidential candidate Vicente Fox, the mayoral election is open to negotiations that are not possible at the national level.

The presidential race is tight, Castañeda explained, and the two top candidates could use the mayoral race to guarantee their victory.

"The result of the Mexico City election is not going to be only who voted for whom," he said. "Behind the scenes all these negotiations are going on."

By retracting the PAN candidate from the mayoral race, Fox could manage to have Cardenas withdraw his candidacy for the presidency, Castañeda said. Likewise, by letting Lopez Obrador win in the city, PRI presidential runner Francisco Labastida could make sure that Cardenas won’t support Fox if Fox accuses the PRI of fraud in the presidential balloting.

"Both Fox and Labastida could give the city to the PRD in exchange of Cardenas’ support in the presidential election," he said.