SUPPORTERS OF MADRAZO OF PRI CLASH WITH SECURITY GUARDS, 2002-02-24 (photo)

Supporters of Roberto Madrazo, candidate for the new leader of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), clash with security guards in Mexico City on February 24, 2002. Some 200 angry Madrazo supporters forced their way into the PRI headquarters and rejected the results, accusing a clique of old-guard politicians of strangling the party's progress. Mexico's biggest political party voted Sunday for a new leader to bolster its sagging ranks and eventually win back the presidency lost in 2000 after 71 years in power. Opinion polls showed a tight race between former Tabasco state Gov. of Tabasco Roberto Madrazo, a dyed-in-the-wool Institutional Revolutionary Party member, and former Tlaxcala Gov. Beatriz Paredes, who until January headed the Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of Congress. REUTERS/Daniel Aguilar REUTERS