Mexicans vote in key regional elections

Mexicans around the country go to the polls on Sunday to vote in key regional elections considered to be a bellwether for the 2018 presidential race.

Observers feel that if Mexico's ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) does well in Sunday's elections for 12 state governors, as well as local posts and a special election in the capital Mexico City, then it will go into the presidential race with a strong hand.

In Mexico City, voters were called to elect 60 members of a new constitutional assembly to draft the city's first ever constitution.

In all, nearly 1,500 seats are up for election, though the gubernatorial races are the most closely watched.

Mexico's President Enrique Pena Nieto cast his vote in Mexico City's elections, and called on the country's 37.4 million eligible voters to go to the polls in "an atmosphere of great civility, tranquility and social harmony."

Voting was progressing "normally," he said, adding "there have been only very isolated incidents. I haven't received any reports of any major events, and I hope that the rest of the day's voting unfolds in the same way."

The 12 states with gubernatorial races include Aguascalientes, Chihuahua, Durango, Hidalgo, Oaxaca, Puebla, Quintana Roo, Sinaloa, Tamaulipas, Tlaxcala, Veracruz and Zacatecas, and the PRI currently governs in nine of those states.

The most contested races are in Aguascalientes, Oaxaca, Tamaulipas, Tlaxcala and especially Veracruz, where the PRI has never lost a gubernatorial race.

Lorenzo Cordova, president of the National Electoral Institute (INE), acknowledged that several incidents were reported, mainly in the states of Veracruz and Oaxaca.

Observers are also looking to see how Mexico's fledgling left-leaning National Regeneration Movement (Morena) will fare in Sunday's contests.

The party was founded two years ago by former presidential candidate and Mexico City mayor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who plans to run again in 2018.

International observers were stationed in different parts of the country, as well as at INE's offices, to ensure the legitimacy of the process.

"The status of the political parties is in play in every position, they may slide or lose ground to rivals or new alliances," Rodian Rangel Rivera, a professor of political science at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), told Xinhua in an interview.

As the seat of the federal government, Mexico City was officially called the Federal District until earlier this year, when that designation was dropped. In a bid to grant the city state-like status, a new constitutional assembly is to draw up a constitution by the end of the year. Endit