Over 100 million Mexicans will cast their votes on Sunday to elect their new president.

In many ways, this election will be like no other that the country has experienced in its modern democratic career. But there are two certainties. Mexico will elect its first female president and her name will be Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo. Buoyed up by support from a popular incumbent and promising to continue the path set by her predecessor, Sheinbaum enjoys enormous electoral support.

According to the opinion polls, Sheinbaum has maintained a comfortable double-digit lead for months over her nearest rival. Unless there is a catastrophic irregularity or tragedy of monumental proportions, she will become president.

A protégée of the outgoing populist president Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO). Sheinbaum promises  continuity. Although not a larger-than-life figure like AMLO, Sheinbaum is no political lightweight. An academic and a technocrat, she has a long resumé – which includes an illustrious career as a successful head of government of Mexico City, an overcrowded megapolis of some 22 million inhabitants.

But Sheinbaum has her work cut out. The list of issues that she has to confront is long.

Gendered violence

In a country long regarded as a bastion of male dominance, a female president will mark a seismic shift in people’s outlook and preference. Mexican women have traditionally suffered extreme levels of gendered violence. More than 3,000 are murdered each year. These abysmal numbers have prompted some Mexicans to describe their country as a “femicide nation”.

“Eleven women are killed in this country every day. We have at least 20,000 women who are missing in Mexico. And the state’s failures in searching for these women and investigating what has happened to them have remained unchanged for almost 30 years now,” the head of Amnesty International Mexico commented a couple of years ago.

Despite AMLO’s talk of gender equality and greater protection of women and their rights, sexual crimes against girls and women have increased. Instead of tacking the issue, López Obrador has described feminist activists as “dark forces” representing the conservative element and the femicide crisis as a product of “neoliberal” policies of previous governments.

Although two female candidates lead the race to the nation’s highest office, “it is unclear how much it will shift the realities of [working] women in the country.”

And more violence

While Sheinbaum has been very vocal in emphasizing national prosperity in her campaign rhetoric, the country is staring into a violent future. The outgoing government followed a hands-off policy in dealing with the narco cartels.

AMLO’s abrazos no balazos (“hugs not bullets”) policy, which emphasized addressing the societal causes of violence, was an utter failure. Instead of curtailing criminal violence the strategy empowered the criminals. When violence rose, the government of AMLO, its critics contend, tried to reduce the official count of the number of dead and disappeared. Mexican gangs multiplied, corrupting local governments and tightening their grip on the economy.

With a few exceptions, the current government has struggled to control the killings, disappearances and acts of extortion. In fact, in the run-up to the June 2 election, dozens of candidates contesting for political positions have been murdered by the cartels.

Xochitil Galvez, the consensus candidate of the combined opposition, has been very vocal about the state of insecurity. “I have a head, I have a heart, but I also have the guts to take on criminals,” Gálvez has said on her campaign trail.

By contrast, Sheinbaum has been vague on her security proposals. When pressed, she has pledged continuity with AMLO’s largely non-confrontational security policies and touted her crime-fighting record as leader of the country’s sprawling capital.