Hundreds of Mexican leftists blocked the offices of three major foreign-owned banks today in growing protests to force a full recount of a July presidential election they claim was rigged.
Supporters of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador surrounded main offices in Mexico City of US-based Citigroup's Mexican unit Banamex, the Bancomer bank owned by Spain's BBVA and the British giant HSBC. They sat on the ground around the buildings and vowed to block access for several hours.
Mr Lopez Obrador narrowly lost the presidential vote to conservative ruling party candidate Felipe Calderon and claims it was rigged.
Election officials began a recount of votes from 9 per cent of polling stations today in a bid to clear up the allegations and calm a crisis that has split the country.
But Mr Lopez Obrador is demanding a full recount of all 41 million votes. His protesters have crippled Mexico City for the past 10 days by setting up tents in its Zocalo square and on the Reforma boulevard running through the business district.
All but one of Mexico's major banks are in the hands of foreign companies and the industry's sell-off has been a symbol of the free market reforms in Mexico disliked by the left.
"It's them who're screwing the nation!" protesters chanted outside the HSBC building, a shiny skyscraper on Reforma, as dozens of riot police stood guard.
The protests had a nationalist tinge. Demonstrators draped a banner in Mexico's red, white and green colors over the front entrance to a large Banamex office in the Spanish colonial center of the capital.
"We're defending the homeland, not the presidency. The homeland is in danger," said leftist Eugenia Rodriguez, 63, a retired teacher from rural San Luis Potosi state.
During the election campaign, Mr Lopez Obrador had promised to reopen the books on a controversial $100 billion bailout of struggling private banks by the government during an economic crisis in the mid-1990s.
"Banamex is really Citigroup, a foreign bank that ransacks the country," said Gerardo Fernandez, spokesman for the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution, or PRD.
Judges, election officials and party representatives will spend up to five days checking the tallies at 11,839 voting stations to see if there is truth to Mr Lopez Obrador's claims that he was cheated in the July 2nd election.