PERSPECTIVE ON MEXICO : Political Opposition Has No Outlet at Polls : Once-promising alternatives to Salinas fade badly. Little wonder there is talk of bombs and guerrillas.

As usual, no one agrees on what actually occurred in this month’s elections in Mexico. Charges of fraud, claims of victory and weighty analysis all clash, suggesting that whatever else may be changing in Mexico, elections and democratic competition for power are not yet part of the country’s customs.

There are some who believe that the ruling party’s overwhelming victory in the congressional and gubernatorial voting was the result of President Carlos Salinas de Gortari’s popularity and his party’s hard work, combined with the unraveling of the opposition. Others, among them this columnist, tend to think that the PRI landslide was at least equally owed to widespread electoral tampering. In either case, what is clear is that the electoral channels for expressing discontent have been shut down by the humiliating defeat of the opposition, left and right, that began to cut into the PRI nine years ago with some historic victories at the state and congressional levels.

Those who supported Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, and who believe that, were it not for electoral fraud, he would have been elected president in 1988, now must face the realities of the political system’s uncommon resilience: Carlos Salinas has a lock on political power in Mexico now and for some time to come. While Cardenas may make a comeback in the 1994 presidential elections, he does not at this time appear as a credible alternative, even to many of those who supported him in 1988.

Similarly, the conservative PAN’s (National Action Party) setbacks in the gubernatorial races in San Luis Potosi, Nuevo Leon and Guanajuato show that it, too, has failed as a regional choice for the expression of discontent with central rule, PRI corruption and authoritarian practices.

In short, those who are happy with things in Mexico today can vote for the PRI and Salinas; those who are not--and they are more numerous than the election results may suggest--must find, or create, a new outlet.

It was no coincidence, then, that on the eve of the elections last weekend small, homemade but effective bombs exploded at three locations in Mexico City, symbolic targets of anti-Establishment contempt: the IBM building, a McDonald’s restaurant and a Sanborn drugstore.

Nor was it an accident that, on the same weekend, the country’s leading news weekly, Proceso, ran a cover story on the guerrilla group that would claim responsibility for the bombings, including an interview from jail with its main figure, David Cabanas (the brother of Lucio Cabanas, the legendary leader of the Mexican guerrilla movement of the 1970s.) The group is undoubtedly deeply infiltrated by the government, and many of its activities are probably carried out at the instigation of one government faction at the expense of another. Most interesting aspect of the article was that the guerrillas’ denunciation of the electoral process eerily resembles the post-election verdict of the PAN and the cardenistas: The electoral option is closed.

The renewed activity by, and attention paid to, the guerrillas confirms the long-held assessment of many analysts, including Hector Aguilar Camin, one of the country’s most lucid intellectuals and a close friend and confidant of President Salinas--and author of a current best-selling novel set in the 1970s guerrilla movement: If electoral channels close down either, as Aguilar Camin believes, because of the opposition’s intransigence and inability to provide a viable alternative or, as others have concluded, as a result of PRI’s unwillingness to allow electoral competition, Mexico’s tradition of violence and its social and demographic structures are a splendid recipe for armed struggle.

Too many youth exist on the margins, with no outlet for their despair and destitution; too many weapons and too much money from links to drugs plague the countryside; too many crevices and gaps in Mexican society exist for any government to control; too many intellectuals draw attention to the political system’s shortcomings.

Together, these elements constitute a fertile breeding ground for the type of guerrilla movement that Cabanas, or others, are building in remote, rural areas like Chiapas, Oaxaca and Guerrero. They cannot seriously threaten Mexican institutions or the status quo, but a small minority with enough money, weapons and despair could easily become a destabilizing force that would have an effect nationally, disproportionate to its numbers. It has happened before, here and elsewhere.

The PRI and Carlos Salinas have effectively neutralized any legitimate political opposition in Mexico. There is no question that this represents a major victory for the president and his team: from having probably lost an election in 1988, to having virtually eliminated electoral competition three years later. But in so doing, they have created another problem: what to do with the discontent of the excluded. This may prove to be a far more difficult riddle to solve than how to win a election, fairly or otherwise.