In one of its final acts, the outgoing Congress of Tabasco state named a former ruling party legislator as acting governor Sunday, two days after a top court stripped the party of its recently won governorship.
The naming of Enrique Priego, 53, came amid protests from opposition parties, which won a major victory Friday when Mexico’s top electoral court annulled the results of the gulf coast state’s October elections, backing their claims that the balloting was marred by errors.
The Supreme Electoral Tribunal’s unprecedented ruling deprived the struggling Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, of the only governorship it had won since losing presidential elections in July after 71 years in power.
Opposition leaders said the new Congress rather than the outgoing PRI-dominated legislature should have picked the acting governor. The PRI does not have absolute majority in the new Congress, which took power after the acting governor was named Sunday.
