El Universal has a story in today's print edition on Rafael Ponfilio Acosta Ángeles, far better known as Juanito, who now know wants to - drumroll - run for mayor of Mexico City. Given that AMLO has vowed to present his "own" candidate in the upcoming Mexico State elections, the charade of Juanito, who was AMLO's candidate in Iztapalapa last year, is briefly worth considering.
To recall, when AMLO's favored candidate Carla Brugada failed to win the PRD's nomination to be the party's candidate for borough chief in the Mexican delegation of Iztapalapa, AMLO engineered the candidacy of Juanito to run on as an AMLO-backed candidate against the official PRD candidate, and called upon the local PRD voters to cast their vote for Juanito, who ran on the label of the Partido del Trabajo (PT) against the PRD candidate. While splitting the vote of the left, the gamble paid off, as Juanito came in first, the PT winning its first-ever delegation in Mexico City, and costing the PRD local representation as well as federal party funding. If there ever was a case of betrayal and "treason," accusations that AMLO like to hurl at the current PRD leadership, it was AMLO's betrayal of the PRD Iztapalapa. In the process he also demonstrated his modus operandi when it comes to respecting outcomes unfavorable to him.
While Juanito won, after heavy campaigning by AMLO, the case became a huge embarrassment to the left and to AMLO in particular, as Juanito didn't stick to his part of the bargain: He was to step down and allow for Brugada to assume as head of Iztapalapa. Months of wrangling, protests, and disturbances followed, until Juanito, who displayed clear signs of medical schizophrenia, eventually relented, then stood firm, then relented again, then refused to step down... etc etc.
Juanito today walks the streets of Mexico City, accusing both AMLO and Marcelo Ebrard, and the PRD as well as the PT, of being "traitors."
AMLO's choice of Juanito as a candidate to short-curcuit PRD's candidate selection in 2009 should stand as a warning, for several reasons. It again demonstrated that AMLO will respect other actors and parties as long as they bend to his will. But even more so, the Juanito debacle displayed a remarkable lack of judgment on part of AMLO and his willingness to engage in complete scorched-earth tactics even against the party that had backed him thick and thin after 2006, having incurred millions of dollars in fines for following his edicts to shut down Mexico City. While the gamble eventually did paid off - Brugada did assume as delegation chief in the end - who is to say that whomever AMLO convinces to run as "his" candidate, will not equally turn his back on AMLO?
And Juanito? He now rents an apartment in the Roma district and has become a die hard... priísta!
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