Oct. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Mexico's Institutional Revolutionary Party declared victory in the Tabasco state governor's race with 96 percent of the vote counted after former presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador failed to influence the outcome.

Andres Granier, 58, whom Lopez Obrador sought to defeat in a non-stop, 20-day campaign on behalf of his party's candidate Cesar Raul Ojeda, holds an insurmountable, 10 percentage-point lead, according to the state election authority's Web site.

The Tabasco election took on national prominence because Lopez Obrador, who continues to claim he won the presidential election, campaigned daily to help Ojeda of the Party of the Democratic Revolution close the gap on Granier, who led by at least 10 percentage points in polls. Lopez Obrador carried Tabasco, his home state, in the July 2 presidential contest.

``Lopez Obrador overreached with his post-election protests,'' Riordan Roett, a political science professor at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore said in a telephone interview. ``A few days of breast beating and marching around would have been fine, but with week after week of protests people just want to get on with their lives.''

Lopez Obrador,52, held marches, rallies and blocked Mexico City's main boulevard for 47 days to protest the results, which he claims are fraudulent. President-elect Felipe Calderon beat Lopez Obrador by less than 0.6 percentage point, the narrowest margin of victory ever in a Mexican presidential election.

A Consulta Mitofsky poll of 1,200 registered voters taken nationwide between August 19 and 27 showed rejection for Lopez Obrador's party rising to 38.9 percent from 30.1 in July. The poll has an error margin of plus or minus 2.8 percentage points.

Exit Polls

After the country's election court rejected Lopez Obrador's claims, the former Mexico City mayor declared himself the ``legitimate'' president in a Sept. 16 rally and vowed to form his own government. Supporters are scheduled to hold a symbolic swearing in ceremony for Lopez Obrador Nov. 20.

The results in Tabasco show that Lopez Obrador's ability to mobilize his followers is fading, Roett said.

Granier, a doctor who has worked in the state and local government in Tabasco, declared victory last night based on exit polls, the Mexico City newspaper El Universal said. Ojeda, 54, a former senator, said the elections were plagued by irregularities, the newspaper reported.

With 96 percent of polling places counted, Granier had 53 percent of the vote compared with 43 percent for Ojeda and 4 percent for Juan F. Caceres of Calderon's National Action Party.

'Social Frustration'

The election in Tabasco, one of Mexico's largest oil processing states, is the second governor's race since the presidential election. Juan Sabines of Lopez Obrador's party won the Chiapas governorship by less than a percentage point in an Aug. 20 vote.

Even as support for Lopez Obrador wanes, his movement could gain steam should Mexico's economy falter under Calderon, said Juan Lindau, chair of the political science department at Colorado College in Colorado Springs.

``A lot of what has sustained Lopez Obrador is general social frustration, including huge income gaps between northern and southern Mexico,'' he said in a telephone interview. ``Calderon really needs to attend to these problems.''

To contact the reporters on this story: Thomas Black in Monterrey at tblack@bloomberg.net; Patrick Harrington in Mexico City at pharrington8@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: October 16, 2006 18:52 EDT