Mexico's former ruling party set to win state votes (Reuters)

ECATEPEC, Mexico (Reuters) – Mexicans voted for new governors in three states on Sunday in races slated to be big wins for the main opposition party and a blow to President Felipe Calderon ahead of next year's presidential election.

The key ballot is in the populous State of Mexico, where the vote is seen as a popularity test for the outgoing governor, Enrique Pena Nieto, an early favorite to win back the presidency for the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI.

The PRI hopes the telegenic Pena Nieto, 44, will be a fresh face for the party whose 70-year rule was dogged by accusations of vote-rigging and corruption before losing power in 2000.

Pena Nieto backs the PRI's gubernatorial candidate, Eruviel Avila, the popular former mayor of the state's largest municipality Ecatepec, where voters turned out despite heavy rains from Tropical Storm Arlene that flooded neighborhoods and closed down streets.

Polls show Avila far ahead of the candidates running for Calderon's conservative National Action Party, or PAN, and the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution, PRD.

"The PAN or the PRD has never come here to help, Eruviel is the only one who has been giving us a hand," 58-year-old housewife Maricarmen Trejo said as she headed to the polls.

The PRI never lost power in the State of Mexico, a bastion of old-style machine politics where opponents accuse the government of using public funds to sway voters.

Opinion polls show the PRI also likely to sweep gubernatorial races in the states of Coahuila and Nayarit, further bolstering its platform for a comeback after a decade on the sidelines during two consecutive PAN governments.

Both states have seen a dramatic rise in drug killings over the past year, a critical liability for Calderon who has staked his term on fighting powerful cartels since taking office in late 2006. With drug violence surging over the past four years -- more than 40,000 deaths to date -- some voters are fed up.

"The violence is always getting closer, you see it touching your family, your neighbors," Israel Segura, 33, a vendor in Ecatepec said.

DRUG MONEY IN CAMPAIGNS

National protests over the past few weeks, led by a crusading poet whose son was killed by drug gangs, has turned up the pressure on Calderon to respond to victims complaints. Security for the first time is overtaking the economy as voters' top concern.

Worries about drug cartels backing candidates are swirling as the country gears up for the 2012 election.

In a rare admission by a politician, former PAN cabinet member Xochitl Galvez told the El Universal daily that she had been offered large sums of money by a cartel while running for governor of the central state of Hidalgo last year.

She did not win the race and said she refused the cash offer but did not say anything at the time out of fear.

"The offer was very clear," Galvez told the newspaper.

A messenger from the drug cartel said, "'I have instructions to give you 50 million pesos ($4.3 million), you are several points down with only a few weeks until the elections. With that money you can pay off all the leaders (so they support you.)'"

Hidalgo is also set to elect 84 new mayors on Sunday.

(Additional reporting by Mica Rosenberg; Writing by Mica Rosenberg; Editing by Paul Simao)

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Edgy Thailand votes, bracing for further turmoil (Reuters)

BANGKOK (Reuters) – Thailand votes on Sunday in a general election that could trigger a new crisis after six years of turmoil centred on a man revered by the poor and living in luxury, and exile, in the Middle East.

Opinion polls point to a win by Puea Thai, led by Yingluck Shinawatra, over the Democrat Party of Oxford-educated Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva.

But the election is all about a vote for or against a man not on the ballot -- former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, Yingluck's elder brother, in self-appointed exile in Dubai after being deposed in a military coup in 2006.

His "red shirt" supporters brought the central district of Bangkok to a standstill in two months of protests last year, shutting businesses and five-star hotels and setting buildings on fire before an army crackdown in which 91 people were killed.

Telecoms tycoon Thaksin is hugely popular with the red shirt supporters of the opposition Puea Thai (For Thais) party, but despised by the ruling Democrat Party elite who want him to return and stand trial for corruption.

Throughout the six-week campaign, both sides have presented similar populist campaigns of subsidies for the poor, improved health care benefits and infrastructure investment including high-speed rail systems across the country.

But a risk of violence lies in the margin of a Puea Thai win and the reaction of the red shirts. Key as well will be the response of the military, which has a habit of intervening in Thai politics through coup d'etat.

The election will be Thailand's 26th since it became a democracy in 1932, ending seven centuries of absolute monarchy. It has since been governed by 17 constitutions and has experienced 18 military coups, either actual or attempted.

The latest, in 2006, overthrew Thaksin.

Former Public Health Minister Phra Rakkiart warned Sunday's election would go down as the "dirtiest in history".

"Canvassers sell lottery tickets to voters and offer them a big reward if their candidates win in the election," the Bangkok Post quoted him as saying, adding that election fraud was ingrained.

The fear of a return to violence is real.

According to some reports, the Puea Thai camp is in talks with the generals on some way of working together should it emerge victorious. Puea Thai would be allowed to govern and the military top brass would remain in place, with early reshuffles limited to middle ranks.

But if Puea Thai gets a majority and is barred from governing, Thailand faces a resurgence of the violent protests that paralyzed parts of Bangkok last April and May.

"If they cheat there will be protests in Bangkok for sure. It will be the same as the Rajaprasong protest," said Tan Chaithep, chief assistant of the red shirt village of Ban Nong Hoo Ling in the heart of red shirt territory in the northeast.

The Rajaprasong intersection was the focal point of last year's demonstrations.

To guard against election fraud, some 180,000 police will be on duty. Thais have been urged to vote early to avoid possible heavy rain and flooding.

(Editing by Brian Rhoads)

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