Mexico: 15 fake transgender candidates disqualified from election

Mexico’s electoral tribunal has disqualified 15 male candidates who pretended to be transgender to get around gender parity rules in the southern state of Oaxaca.

The indigenous Zapotec community of the isthmus of Tehuantepec has long recognized a third gender of transgender people known as muxes – who are born with male bodies, but identify as neither male or female.

Electoral rules in Oaxaca allow muxes to occupy candidacies designated for women.

On Friday, the tribunal – the final referee in political and electoral matters – ruled that the disqualified candidates were not known to be muxes before the candidate registration period.

Two others candidates who had been disqualified by state electoral officials on similar grounds were ruled eligible, however, as they had consistently identified as transgender. The tribunal ordered the candidacies vacated by the disqualified candidates be filled by women.

The ruling proved thorny for the tribunal, which said in a statement: “The manifestation of belonging to a gender is sufficient to justify the self-registration of a person.”

But the tribunal added: “Electoral authorities must take care with the possible misuse of self-registration, to not permit … the transgender identity be utilized in a deceptive way to comply with the constitutional principle of equity.”

Mexico holds elections on 1 July, when the country elects a new president, renews both houses of Congress and elects hundreds of state and municipal officials.

“Not a single spot designated for men was filled by a transgender person. However, 19 places designated for women … were filled by men who say they’re transgender,” said Anabel López Sánchez, director of the Women’s Citizenship Collective in Oaxaca, which denounced the phoney candidates in May.

Mexico has gradually introduced gender parity rules over the past two decades. Previous rules mandated a 60-40 gender split in nominations, while a constitutional reform in 2013 required a 50-50 balance in all congressional candidacies.

But candidates have attempted to get round the law from the start. In 2009, eight female lawmakers requested leaves of absence immediately after taking their oath of office and were replaced by male substitutes.