Peña Nieto's frontal assault on democracy: Legislation fast-tracks through Mexico State Congress

The initiative by the Green Party (PVEM) to impede the formation of electoral alliances in the upcoming gubernatorial elections in Mexico State, breezed through the local legislature in Mexico State after a cursory hearing with such a speed that designating it a "fast-track" hardly does it justice.  


What it does:
* While the legislation does pretend to block alliances, it will still allow common candidates, in the sense that PAN and PRD can still present a common one for 2011. However, should this legislation pass the full floor vote, they now basically have to register as one electoral party-coalition, rather than four separate parties  (PAN, PRD-PT-Convergencia) with separate lists for deputies and municipal presidents, as well as, crucially, separate funding. They will only have one common representative at the state electoral institute, which arranges the election and addresses irregularities, as well as only one representative at the ballot box. They will, in essence, operate in a "reverse gestalt," for lack of better word, where the total sum of the four parties will be considerably less than their component four parts. 


--> Note here that on the national level, the 2007 Electoral Reform went the opposite direction: While e.g. PT and Convergencia extracted a huge number of "safe seats" from the PRD as a price for going into a full coalition (all votes went to the coalition, not the individual parties) in 2006, this was changed at the federal level as the smaller parties now will have to carry their own weight - they have to present their own legislative/municipal lists rather than negotiating safe seats and "vote transfers" in advance. 


* In addition, however, the legislation also aims at greatly reducing the campaign time from 72 and 60 days for governor and deputies/municipal presidents, respectively, to 45 and 30. Clearly this is directly going to favor the party that already is receiving near total permanent coverage in the media, PRI and its candidate Enrique Peña Nieto. 


* Other measures to reduce party spending as well as methods to designate party representatives at the ballot stations, both intended to favor the sitting PRI. More here later. 


PRI and PVEM voted in commitee to bring the proposed legislation up to a floor vote, and was backed in this by none other than Convergencia, a quintessentially opportunist party that rivals the PVEM in frequency of turnings its cape to the wind (the same party is, to recall, on the national level an ardent backer of Andrés Manuel López Obrador), as well as PANAL and the Partido Social Demócrata (PSD) (the latter is now-defunct on the national level, and its representative in Mexico State is a PRI member in all but name). 


Peña Nieto, in his usual slick doublespeak, claimed he and the PRI were not against alliances at all:

 "What the PRI want is rather to promote a legal framework that permits transparent political competition, and that doesn't create confusion."

Beyond such niceties, this initative is far from aimed at ending confusion, but directly to seek to block a common PRD-PAN candidate in 2011, as well as other measures intended to directly favor the PRI candidate.

Now PRI/PVEM and its backers claims that such amalgams represent a more clear option than common candidacies, where parties run on their own separate labels and lists yet combine to put forth e.g. a common gubernatorial candidate.  The argument does not hold water even in a cursory reading.

PRI/PVEM are using the case of Guanajuato as a precedent; there, the local congress voted to ban common candidacies, which was appealed unsuccesfully to the Supreme Court. Yet the comparison is a spurious one, for a range of reasons, most importantly as it didn't apply to gubernatorial candidates, but municipal-level offices.

Luis Sánchez Jiménez, leader of the Mexico State branch of PRD and one of the most capable of PRD's cadres, deemed Peña Nieto "a danger to democracy and to the country." It is certainly a clear demonstration of the lengths of institutional engineering to which Peña Nieta is willing to go to reach the Mexican presidency.  PRD president Jesús Ortega gets the final word:

"Peña Nieto is on several fronts doing everything possible to prevent the alliance. He knows the risk of a democratic union that can beat him and the PRI in elections in the State of Mexico, and this will be a mortal blow, not only toward his pretensions to be President of the Republic, but a mortal blow to the person who appears today as the candidate of the oligarchy."

Manuel Añorve Baños offical PRI candidate, with Rubén Figueroa Alcocer in the audience

Manuel Añorve Baños, mayor of Acapulco, was designated a "unity candidate" by the PRI's Political Council in Guerrero State for next year's gubernatorial elections.

With no apparent sense of irony, Añorve claimed "I represent the future," with former Rubén Figueroa Alcocer present in the audience. Figueroa, to recall, was kicked out by the state legislature following the infamous Aguas Blancas massacre on June 28, 1995, where 17 campesions were executed in cold blood by police agents, and which Figueroa for the longest denied had ever occurred, until video images of the murders surfaced.

To his credit, Añorve did call for dialogue with the many armed guerrilla-like groups that still exist in Guerrero.  He will now face off against his cousin Ángel Aguirre Rivero as his main opponent. 

Miguel Alonso Reyes assumes as Zacatecas governor, will investigate Amalia García's government

Miguel Alonso Reyes, the first of the governors elected the past July 4th to assume power, had very harsh words for the outgoing state administration of Amalia García Medina. Alonso declared in his inauguration ceremony,

"Our people people reprove of the profit making for the personal and family gain of our rulers. We reject the irresponsible practice of those tho feel that public goods and the government are their property. The exercise of public service is always to serve."

Very strong words, especially with Amalia García just meters away from the podium. The new governor declared he would revise the public accounts and budget spending for any irregularities. Denunciations of nepotism involving García and her daughter Claudia Sofía Corichi García have certainly been flying around for quite some time, and one might find out whether these had any substance. 

Miguel Alonso, notably, is  former PRD member who held positions in both García's and her predecessor Ricardo Monreal's government, but ditched the PRD to run on a PRI-PVEM-PANAL coalition. His victory, which meant the PRD's loss of Zacatecas after 12 years of governing, has primarily been attributed to a mediocre performance by Amalia García, who was strongly criticized by Alonso for leaving Zacatecas with declining social indicators and economic performance standards.

García saw her presidential ambitions pretty much squashed after failing to impose Antonio Mejía Haro as her successor, but the failure of PRD-PT-Convergencia to present a common candidate - Monreal has since ditched the PRD and worked for a separate PT candidate - was clearly of huge importance as well. 

Much like in 2006, TEPJF condemns Durango election irregularities yet certifies election of Jorge Herrera Caldera

Less than three weeks after PAN leader César Nava and PRD leader Jesús Ortega went to the TEPJF to protest the Durango election - the first time in Mexican history that both party leaders together went to TEPJF to demand elections annulled - Mexico's highest tribunal nonetheless affirmed the victory of Jorge Herrera Caldera, PRI governor-elect. Ortega and Nava documented abuses such as the harassment of PRD activists, as well as the blatant interference by outgoing governor Ismael Hernández.

TEPJF, for its part, condemned the stealing of 6 ballot urns, and gunfire at one voting center with 18 other urns, ut, in an echo of its verdict in the tumultuous 2006 election, while it acknowledged irregularities it declared there was not evidence that this directly affected the outcome in the election, the court in other words venturing into the field of social science and likelihood estimation. In the end, Jorge Herrera Caldera will assume as governor the coming Wednesday. Now the next case to be decided by TEPJF is the equally controversial election in Hidalgo.

(Final vote tally: 293, 806 for Herrera, vs. 278,295 for the coalition behind José Rosas Aispuro, Durango Nos Une)

La Jornada and AMLO: An admiration that distorts its journalistic mission

La Jornada is a very important Mexican newspaper that reports on stories of social interest often neglected by the other large newspapers. It's advocacy for democracy, ever since its 1984 inception, is admirable.

Yet La Jornada's excessive admiration for AMLO has at times reached such heights that it seriously distorts political reality. Take for instance La Jornada's coverage of this weekend's meeting of the PRD's National Council, which is undergoing - as it has for two decades - a brutal fight between the movement-advocates behind AMLO and the party-building social democrats behind Jesús Ortega. According to reporter Alma Muñoz, who has covered the PRD for a long time and should know - I am convinced she does - better:

"In a press conference [Ortega] unveiled two resolutory points, supposedly approved during the sessions of the national council, adjourned indefinitely  due to a lack of consensus among the party factions: There will be no elections December 5, and the policy of alliances will be maintained, after [Ortega's] group impeded that these subjects were part of the order of the day."

Where does one start... First, why "supposedly"? These resolutions were duly voted over by the entire national council, and the final vote tally was 146-97 and 142-93 against, respectively, bringing up the alliances for debate, and against having new elections in December. Why "supposedly"? Was the reporter not present? Did this in any way not signify a valid vote? What is it that she knows that we do not? The simple truth is: Those two votes were a test of strength between the andresmanuelistas and the social democrats, and the latter came up on top. Second, why does Muñoz write the council was adjourned "due to a lack of consensus"? The council was adjourned after the andresmanuelistas lost the vote, which they as always refuse to accept, and then proceeded to "take" the council tribune in retaliation. Why doesn't La Jornada report on this? The article itself brings in several quotations from opponents of Ortega, such as Dolores Padierna, yet none of his backers... indeed, another article by Víctor Ballinas in the same newspaper interviews three Senators from the PRD, all of whom strongly criticizes Ortega. Yet these people are a minority in the party - why not interview any of Ortega's many backers? Because it simply doesn't fit with the narrative, as John Stewart often mocks U.S. news organizations for? Functionally, La Jornada is unfortunately appearing a little too much like a Fox News of the left.

Mexican Senate approves reform allowing more protection for migrants

While the legislation clearly got a push by external events such as the recent gruesome massacre of 72 Latin American immigrants in Tamaulipas, the Mexican Senate to its credit voted unamimously to approve a change to the Ley General de Población regarding the rights of immigrants and the duties of the Mexican state toward them. It improves on crucial areas such as:


- Guaranteeing medical attention to migrants by local, state, and federal authorites.
- Functionaries of the Interior ministry who abuses immigrants will be fined or fired
- Migrants, whether passing through Mexico or seeking to stay permanently, can legally denounce authorities for human rights abuses without fear of being turned in for deportation.


All these aspects were treated in an excellent report by Amnesty International earlier this year. While much remains - indeed, much of Mexico's thunder against the treatment of Mexicans in the United States is undermined by its own inadequate protection of migrants in Mexico - this is a huge step forward.
As PRD Senator Rubén Fernando Velázquez declared, cThe time has come for us not to criminalize migrants who pass by our country."


The Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of Congress, voted on the legislation in March, and it will become law as soon as it is published officially in the Diario Oficial de la Federación.

Rene Bejarano mobilizes movement supporters yet bides his time

René Bejarano is biding his time. This weekend, in a show of strenght, AMLO's one-time political operator filled a stadium of followers of his Movimiento Nacional por la Esperanza, or "National Movement of Hope," a relatively new movement-based outfit with which he is currently identitied.

Bejarano harangued against"petty" and  "arrogant" politicians, in a marked anti-party discourse so typical of the kind of "social movements" represented by Bejarano, even though the party current IDN, founded by Bejarano yet nominally led by his wife Dolores Padierna, remains one of the largest within the PRD. 

Within the PRD, the IDN, while appearing as one of the most "radical" of PRD's factions unequivocally loyal to AMLO, remains nonetheless and inherently opportunisit personal tool of Bejarano-Padiern  that might well switch to back AMLO's successor as Chief of Government of Mexico City, Marcelo Ebrard. 

Notably, Bejarano has been observed several times recently meeting with Ebrard, who is seeking the support of Bejarano's clientelist networks for his 2012 presidential candidacy. Whether Bejarano will go for AMLO or Ebrard will in the end be a question of who will be the highest bidder.