Mexican Presidential 2006 campaign comes to TJ
August 19, 2005
Political News
The Billion-Dollar Campaign Unfolds in the North
The Two Tabascans brought their political campaigns to the northern border
states this week. Presidential hopefuls Roberto Madrazo of the Institutional
Revolutionary Party (PRI) and Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador of the Party of the
Democratic Revolution (PRD) toured Baja California and Chihuahua, respectively,
gathering thousands of their supporters. Madrazo, who is leaving the PRI's
national presidency to pursue the presidential nomination of his party,
appeared before a large crowd in Tijuana variously estimated at between 10,000
and 25,000 people on Wednesday, August 17. Addressing an audience which
included many people reportedly bused in from working-class neighborhoods,
Madrazo focused on political and security issues.
The former Tabasco governor proposed limiting campaign spending and the length
of electoral campaigns to 30 days, implementing "extraordinary" measures to
combat public insecurity and clarifying voting procedures next year for
Mexicans living abroad. Speaking in a city where narco-violence is chronic,
Madrazo attributed much of the violent upsurge to the failure of intelligence
organisms who spend more time "watching what journalists and politicians are
saying instead of organized crime."
Madrazo announced he was against costly, mail-reliant plans to allow Mexicans
living abroad to vote in the July 2006 presidential election, because of the
possibility of vote-buying and fradulent registrations. Sounding confident, the
leading candidate for the PRI's nomination vowed that his party will not repeat
the same mistakes as it did in the 2000 election. "The PRI started late in
2000," Madrazo said. "We had a campaign since November (1999), but we didn't
begin it until the month of March, wasting many months without a campaign." The
former Tabasco governor and one-time favorite of Carlos Salinas de Gortari was
accompanied during his tour by the mayors of Tecate and Mexicali, Joaquin
Sandoval and Samuel Ramos, as well as Tijuana Mayor Jorge Hank Rhon.
Catching ample press attention were the fielding of municipal Tijuana workers
to clean up the streets before Madrazo's visit and the deployment of local
police as escorts for the PRI candidate and his supporters during political
events. Juan Manuel Gastelum Buenrostro, the Tijuana director of the National
Action Party (PAN) criticized the municipal administration for spending public
money on partisan purposes, but Madrazo insisted the PRI paid for his Tijuana
campaigning.
In Chihuahua state, the PRD's virtual candidate, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador,
spoke to combined crowds of about 3,500 people in Ciudad Juarez and Chihuahua
City on Thursday, August 18. "El Peje," as he is called, spoke about improving
U.S.-Mexico relations, the North American Free Trade Agreement, public security
and the social safety net. Lopez Obrador said border problems could not be
solved by "walls, border patrols or the suspension and closure of consulates"
and urged a more equitable relationship between the U.S. and Mexico. He
proposed greater social spending on Mexico's marginalized sectors, adding the
money could come from curbing government waste, collecting more taxes and
fighting corruption. Lopez Obrador emphasized the difference between his
political project and those of the rival PRI and PAN parties, contending
Mexico's other two leading parties were like "Pepsi Cola and Coca Cola-no major
difference."
The former Mexico City mayor hinted at another possible revenue steam when he
suggested that a social clause to the North American Free Trade Agreement could
be negotiated to pay for development in Mexico. Canada and the United States
could fund such a program, Lopez Obrador said. The PRD leader blamed corrupt
police for the violence plaguing the north, promising to reform the Federal
Attorney General's Office and purge the judicial police. On the issue of the
border femicides, Lopez Obrador promised not to opportunistically utilize the
issue in the presidential campaign, but offered no specific proposal to address
the crimes, other than saying he would energetically confront organized
crime.
Accompanying Lopez Obrador on his Chihuahua tour was his high-level political
operative, Manuel Camacho Solis, another former mayor of Mexico. Camacho
rejected possibilities of a dialogue between Lopez Obrador and the Zapatista
National Liberation Army (EZLN) and the insurgent organization's Subcomandante
Marcos. The EZLN leadership recently blasted the PRD and Lopez Obrador,
revealing deep rifts in the Mexican left. The Chiapas-based group accused the
PRD of betrayal and pledged to sink the center-left's party campaign.
Camacho said the Lopez Obrador camp had a different vision of political change
than the EZLN, affirming that the PRD was banking on the electoral system to
produce reforms while the EZLN was emulating Bolivian activists who prefer "the
politics of the street." Lopez Obrador faces other doubters on the left too,
most notably from the PRD's moral leader, Cuahtemoc Card##as, who remarked this
week that Lopez Obrador's economic program was similar to those of previous
presidents.
Although the 2006 presidential campaign has yet to formally commence, this
week's campaign activities in the north were a signal that the big race has
really begun. Neither Madrazo nor Lopez Obrador have the official nominations
of their respective parties, but most observers agree that both men practically
have the internal selections in their pockets and will go head to head next
year for the occupancy of Los Pinos. The presidential race will be Mexico's
most expensive ever. On Thursday, August 18, the country's Federal Electoral
Institute announced a budget of slightly more than one billion dollars in
public money for the campaign-a record amount.
Sources: El Diario de Juarez, August 19, 2005. Articles by Gabriela Minjares
and Sandra Rodriguez. Proceso/Apro, August 19, 2005. Article by Jenaro
Villamil. El Universal/Notimex, August 19, 2005. El Economista, August 19,
2005. Article by Elena Michel. El Universal, August 19, 2005. Article by Luis
Carlos Cano C. La Jornada, August 19, 2005. Articles by Agustin Salgado, Ruben
Villalpando, Miroslava Breach Velducea, and correspondents. Procesco/Apro,
August 18, 2005. Article by Juan Arturo Salinas. Frontera, August 18, 2005.
Article by Fausto Ovalle.
Frontera NorteSur (FNS): on-line, U.S.-Mexico border news
Center for Latin American and Border Studies
New Mexico State University
Las Cruces, New Mexico
My smidgen of a claim to fame is that I have had so many really good friends. By Bernie Swaim December 2007
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