Mexican Politcs: the Mexican elections

Following are a cross-section of points of view about the Mexican state elections of July 4.

An Anti-Incumbancy Wave -- in Mexico On Sunday, in 14 of Mexico's 32 states, millions of citizens went to the polls and, defying the threat of violence from drug cartels, decisively consolidated our young democracy..... They did not, as had been feared, simply entrust local government in all 14 states to the PRI...What voters did in many places was simply vote out corrupt or inefficient incumbent governors, mayors and other state and local officials -- regrardless of party. Now, though the return of the PRI in 2012 is still probable, it is no longer inevitable. July 6, 2010, NY Times OpEd by Enrique Krauze, editor of the magazine Letras Libres and author of "Mexico: Biography of Power."

Two parties claim victory in Mexico state elections after campaign marred by violence   Turnout was low, but not as low as feared. The vote Sunday took place against a backdrop of sensational violence.... But all in all, the 2010 elections in Mexico were relatively calm. Both major parties claimed victory. July 6, 2010, Washington Post.


Winners and Losers 

Win: without a doubt, the PAN-PRD alliance. They picked up three governorships (Oaxaca, Puebla, and Sinaloa) that would have never been one by either party alone. They were in it in Durango and garnered admirable numbers in Hidalgo. July 5, 2010,  Mexico Institute/Milenio (from article in Spanish)

Vote shows Mexicans have little faith in any party The mixed outcome in elections across 15 states showed no party has won the faith of Mexicans desperate to bring their country out of a quagmire of economic stagnation and relentless gang wars, July 5, 2010, AP

Autonomous Triqui Community Wary of New Oaxaca Government The autonomous indigenous Triqui community of San Juan Copala, in the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca, is maintaining a cautious attitude towards the state government to take power after winning Sunday's elections. The community is made up of 786 people and declared autonomy in 2007. Since January it has been under a blockade, enforced by paramilitaries belonging to the Union for the Wellbeing of the Triqui Region (UBISORT). UBISORT is an illegal armed group accused of ties with the current state government, led by Governor Ulises Ruiz, of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which has governed the state for eight decades. July 5, 2010, InterPress Service


Mexican Democracy, Even Under Seige Mexico's voters.... turned out in relatively large numbers to choose new governors, mayors and state representatives over the weekend and managed to send an inspiring message amid all the violence. Mexico's democracy, flawed as it may be, endures. July 5, 2010, NY Times 

Collateral Damage: Mexico's Elections

Mexico's Elections: A Bleak Panorama Statement by the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, July 2, 2010.

This Sunday, July 4, Mexico will hold elections for a number of important governorships and mayoralties, .... ... this round already has been marred by gruesome violence against candidates and supporters of all parties. Many of these events...are unquestionably directly tied to drug gangs. The violence has raised well-founded fears that neither the elections nor the victories which they will yield will be insulated from the persuasive power of huge levels of narco-funds and narco-violence. Four years after President Felipe Calderón initiated his tragically ill-advised and poorly conceived attempt to defeat the drug gangs, the bitter harvest of the struggle is sure to come to light. As politics and narcotics become increasingly intertwined in Mexico, the cycle of violence will only be broken by a more sensible U.S. policy toward Mexico. Washington must reconsider its approach to domestic drug consumption, revive a long-lost commitment to social and economic development among Mexico’s lower classes, and avoid further militarizing an already sanguinary situation south of the border. Unless the U.S. takes such positive steps, the situation will invariably slide toward levels of instability, duplicating the Pakistan-Afghanistan crucible.

Mexican politics: Democracy Exhausted

Column of Sergio Aguayo
La Reforma, June 30, 2010
Original in Spanish at: Se Agotó
[Sergio Aguayo is a Professor at the Center for International Studies of the College of Mexico and an author of many books, including El Panteón de los Mitos, about the US - Mexico relationship from the 1940's to the mid 1980´s.]

The assassination of Rodolfo Torre Cantú in Tamaulipas once again confirms that the principal achievement of the transition to democracy is exhausted. What now?

Democracy is rigorous. To function properly, it requires a minimum of ecomomic and physical security. It has been ten years since there was a change of parties in the Presidency and we continue being a country of poor people and billionaires, while violence overwhelms understanding. They executed Torre Cantú. Why did they do this, or what did they want to do? We´ll never know. Instead of certainties, they will overwhelm us with versions that will serve as walls for building the chapel of Saint Impunity, stepsister of Saint Death (Santa Muerte, the saint of the narcotraffickers).

In 2000 we thought that we had arrived at the Olympus of credible elections. In 2006, we became disillusioned, and in the 2010 elections we observe with amazement how elections are controlled by a few. Let's not delude ourselves. Citizens are bit players of the big electors: the bureaucracies of the parties, governors, some businessmen and unions, organized crime. They fight so fiercely because they are betting for positions, budgets and business. There is no fairness, control over money or certainty, because the electoral bodies are subjugated or frightened. And now we see how the ballot box is the modern version of the sacrificial stone.

Everything considered, we are back at the beginning of the transition to democracy. Those opposed to the established order have three ways to proceed: take up arms, continue believing that redemption will come in some way by means of the vote, or insist on the daily defense of rights under adverse conditions. I reject violence, and in the current conditions, I will continue to annul my vote. It would be masochistic to continue to focus ourselves so much on elections when democracy is also constructed in other ways. All we have left is permanent commitment.

Let´s start rewriting history. It is false that the parties were the protagonists of the transition. They did something, of course, but society had much more prominent participation. So much so that the parties could compete at the polls after the social movements in which the parties had a marginal role. The student movement of 1968 and the Dirty War led to the reforms of 1977, and the Zapatista and civic rebellions of 1994 led to the 1996 legislation. These electoral reforms both brought the parties to prominence and enriched them, such that having the lead, they stopped worrying about gaining the authority that is granted by citizens. Up until today, the parties are a burden, not a vanguard.

Organized society is the vanguard of the future. It ought to rethink itself, renew itself and reactivate itself. Among its tasks is the identification of those who corrupt public life in many ways. Also, it needs to put pressure simultaneously on the organizations  charged with protecting rights. These organizations are the natural allies of citizens, althought at times they do whatever is possible to ignore them.

In my native Jalisco, in the city of Guadalajara, there is a member of the city council named Gamaliel Ramírez. Kicking soccer balls with an aura of celebrity has allowed him to hold various public offices through his party, PRI. By means of a swap of candidates, he now serves as city councilman for the Green Environmental Party of Mexico. Although the "Green" "Party" proclaims, in its Declaration of Principles, "respect for all manifestations of life," some days ago Gamaliel Ramírez condemned the gay pride march in Guadalajara because they marched, "out-of-sync, almost semi-naked; because we don't want a Guadalajara suffering from AIDS."

This isn't the first time that he made a homophobic statement. When looking for votes in 2009, he disqualified gays, calling them "a ball of fags," "abnormal" and "harmful things." The Institute for the Electoral Process and Citizen Participation of the State of Jalisco allowed these statements to pass, of course. Those affected were right to file a complaint with the National Council to Prevent Discrimination. Those who lead this ought to make a clear, direct pronouncement.

There are many other causes for which to fight. There will not always be justice, but it is a dignified way to endure a failed democracy while, in some spaces the conditions for the flourishing of fair and credible elections are created. Today, this way has already been exhausted.

Miscellany


I'll be in Oaxaca on the eve of the election to support the Civic Alliance in its heroic defense of fair play in the election. Collective reflection is needed and it is a way of expressing my being fed up with the abuses and cynicism of Ulises Ruiz, who has exceeded the limits of decency. Clearly, I don´t do this out of sympathy for PAN or PRD, which now wander about like "crybabies" when they were accomplices in the destruction of democratic culture.

Collaborator: Rodrigo Gonzalez Peña

Collateral Damage: Votes, tricks and bullets

[Editor´s comment: This column, about the July 4 elections in Mexico, clearly describes the challenges that the current political and civil situation in the country presents to the development of democracy in Mexico.] 

 Original Spanish version at: Votos, trampas ybalas

José Antonio Crespo

July 2, 2010

What guarantees of cleanness, safety and validity can Sunday's election offer?  What options do citizens have?

While the assassination of Rodolfo Torre is a major setback to the fragile Mexican democracy, that democracy has already been systematically stuck by the political class. Before and after the tragedy, we saw a gallery of political pettiness from all parties and many levels of government. Ten years after the first democratic change in our history, we are now facing a scenario not unlike that which prevailed 20 years ago in electoral matters. We face authentic state elections where there are no minimum guarantees of fairness, transparency and impartiality, and there is direct use of public resources in favor of parties and official candidates. There is evidence that election  officials have been under the control of various parts of the Executive Branch. This prevents there being an adequate, minimum credibility in the electoral process.

Electoral confidence vanishes because of the illegal war between political parties nakedly fighting for political booty and control of the budget above all.

On the other hand, the drug trafficker reaches the same goal with the possibility of black money in campaigns, candidates accused of links with the cartels and, even worse, the increasing level of murders by hired assassins. The stings of the agitated wasps are greater each time, and each time fewer spaces in the national house are saved from the dangerous onslaught of political weddings. In the face of the electoral violence of the narcotraffickers and with elections being held in multiple states, what guarantees of cleanliness, safety and validity can the elections of Sunday have? What options do citizens have, facing all of this?

Not long ago, the Interior Minister, Fernando Gómez Mont, predicted that, beginning this month, we would see the level of violence go down. And to encourage voter participation in such difficult conditions, he said, "The State is there to protect them, to go out and vote, to fulfill their political duties." (May 25, 2010) Reality soon took charge, contradicting the Secretary, as much in regard to the decrease in violence as in the State's ability to protect citizens. 

If the State took a hand in the abduction of Diego Fernandez de Cevallos, if you cannot provide security for a presumptive governor, if you cannot care for the lives of your prisoners, if people trying to cure their drug addiction in rehabilitation centers are executed, if you cannot prevent a city like Monterrey from being strangled in its roadways by the drug traffickers, could we blame the citizens in the areas most affected by violence if they decided it is best not to take the risk? That already happened last year, as the cities hardest hit by the drug violence showed a very low rate of participation, such as Ciudad Juarez (27%), Acapulco (28%), Tijuana (29%), Nuevo Laredo Reynosa (36%), and Culiacán (37%). It may be possible that, at least in Tamaulipas the reaction of the electorate may be the opposite, to express their outrage and determination not to be swayed by organized crime by going to the polls in large numbers.

Both these reasons that impair democracy -- the lack of respect for the electoral law on the part of the parties, governors and candidates, as well as the insecurity derived from narcotrafficking -- affect the credibility of the electoral process and electoral enthusiasm. That "votes will always be more powerful than bullets" sounds fine, but those who have reduced the strength of voting have been the political class itself, rather than the drug trafficking. 

For this reason, due to the inability of the government at all levels to ensure the safety of the population and the growing rejection of the existing strategy, movements to vote "No" have emerged as a means of protest in Chihuahua. The same in Puebla, due to the unreliability of the process itself and the absence of a genuine conmmitment of the political class to the electorate.

A difficult crossroads confronts the voters next Sunday: vote for the opposition in order to move things towards a hopeful alternative, refrain for fear of bullets, cancel the vote because of lack of faith in the process or lack of conviincing alternatives, or go to the polls and vote for the party that may strengthen our increasingly fragile political institutions. It remains to be seen. 

The War on Drugs

Editor's comment: The following is excerpted from the U.S. State Department briefing of June 29, 2010, regarding the assassination of Dr. Rodolfo Torre Cantu, PRI candidate for governor in the State of Tamaulipas. It makes clear that the U.S. government is sticking by its guns, literally.


State Department Press Briefing, June 29, 2010.
Statement and questions regarding the assassination of Tamaulipas gubernatorial candidate  
MR. DUGUID: Thank you all for attending today. Welcome to the State Department. I have several announcements just before we begin. In the first, I would like to say that the United States is shocked and saddened by the brutal murders of Tamaulipas candidate Dr. Rodolfo Torre Cantu and his colleagues which occurred on June 28^th. We offer our condolences to the families and we offer our condolences to their supporters.


(after questions on other matters were addressed)
QUESTION: On Mexico, I would like to know, do you believe this is a serious setback to the efforts of Mexico and the U.S. to control the violence originated by the drug cartels? [editor's emphasis] Do you also believe this is maybe the steps that Colombia was following when they had a similar problem?

MR. DUGUID: What has happened is a tragedy and it is evidence that our fight against drug cartels and against criminal violence needs to continue, it needs to be strengthened, and we need to pursue it vigorously. The loss of any life is regretted and regrettable, but it is not a loss of our confidence that we can together as two nations defeat this violence.

QUESTION: But do you think this escalation of violence can maybe force to change the current strategy from --

MR. DUGUID: I think that in some cases, as it has been described to me, that a resulting uptick in the violence is a reaction to the success of the program. That isn’t to say that there isn’t much work to be done and certainly the protection of civilian life, innocent life, is something that programs that we share together must try and address. But I don’t see that we should change our strategy based on this particular incident. What we should (do) is strengthen and pursue our strategy vigorously.

QUESTION: Do you believe this is going to get worse before it gets better?

MR. DUGUID: I won’t speculate on where the course goes from this point.

The War on Drugs

Killing of Mexcian Governor Front-runner Stirs Concern for Democratic Process Rodolfo Torre, the front-runner in this weekend's gubernatorial election in the violence-plagued northern state of Tamaulipas, was ambushed and killed Monday. The slayings of Torre and four other people in his party underscored what analysts and officials on both sides of the border said was the pervasive influence of criminal organizations and their determination to decide who governs Mexico. ... A U.S. law enforcement intelligence official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the Torre killing represented the arrival of a darker and more imminent threat to Mexico in which politicians will increasingly be targeted. June 29, 2010, Dallas Morning News


Mexico´s Meth Warriors Mexico's newest drug cartel, and certainly the most bizarre, is La Familia Michoacana, a violent but Christian fundamentalist narco-gang based in the torrid Tierra Caliente region of western Michoacan state. The group is infamous for methamphetamine smuggling, lopping off enemies' heads and limbs, and massacring police and soldiers. ... La Familia is establishing a troubling new narco-business model: It doesn't merely buy off officials, it puts its own candidates in power. "Other cartels just pay off the political structure in order to be able to do their business," says a Michoacan investigator, who estimates the group controls 83 of the state's 113 municipal governments. "La Familia is making itself the political structure." June 28, 2010, Time


The New Cocaine Cowboys NY Times OpEd by Robert  C. Bonner, senior principal of the Sentinel Group and former administrator of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration under President George H.W. Bush from 1990 to 1993 and commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection under President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2005. 
In the last two decades, Mexican drug cartels have acquired unprecedented power to corrupt and intimidate. Three factors account for their rise: pre-existing corruption, the inability of weak law enforcement institutions to counter them, and the demand for illegal drugs in the United States. ... The situation in Mexico today, including the violence, is similar to the one that Colombia faced 20 years ago. ... There are several lessons to be drawn from Colombia’s successful campaign.

New Focus

The U.S. and Mexico are increasingly interdependent. Three critical issues are coming to dominate this interdependence:

• The War over Drugs
• Migration and the Border
• Globalization and Politics. 

The dynamics of these issues are changing almost daily. The Americas Program believes it is crucial to stay abreast of these developments.

Therefore, The Americas  MexicoBlog will now be providing current updates of news about each of them.