Mexico elections: Ghosts of the past haunt a united opposition against López Obrador

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The parties that once shared power in Mexico compete in the June 6 elections in an unprecedented opposition coalition that denounces the “danger” to democracy posed by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, while seeking to get rid of the stigma of corruption.

“Va por México” is the name given to the eclectic union between the right-wing National Action Party (PAN), the once hegemonic Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), and the left-wing Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), seeking to undermine the power of the president.

Their objective is to prevent the triumph of the ruling National Regeneration Movement (Morena) party in the Chamber of Deputies, 15 state governments, 30 local congresses, and the thousands of city councils at stake in the largest elections in Mexico’s history.

UNITED AGAINST THE PRESIDENT

“We built an alliance that was not easy, with parties that on many occasions were our adversaries; however we were united to rescue this country from disaster,” said PRI secretary general Carolina Viggiano.

PRI was the party that held power in Mexico for seven decades until, in 2000, PAN won the presidency, with Vicente Fox and then Felipe Calderón, who was succeeded in 2012 by another PRI member Enrique Peña Nieto.

PRD was the traditional party of the left that controlled Mexico City but was diluted by internal splits until López Obrador left it to found Morena, a party with which he has governed with a comfortable majority since 2018 and which is favored in the upcoming elections.

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Sponsored by businessman Gustavo de Hoyos and activist Claudio X. González, the coalition wants to prevent Morena obtaining an overwhelming majority which would “become a steamroller”.

Viggiano asserts that the opposition deputies would act “as a block” to stop the President’s “authoritarianism”, reverse the economic austerity plan , and put women and cancer patients, whom they consider abandoned by the government, at the center.

“We have all given up many things because there is a higher purpose which is our country. The goal is that the factional groups that have decided to break the constitutional order and the law do not have an absolute majority,” said Margarita Zavala, wife of Felipe Calderón and candidate for deputy with PAN.

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Zavala, who returned to PAN after attempting to create a new right-wing party, said she has “absolute hope” that the coalition will stem the Morena tsunami. But it does not look easy.

THE GHOSTS OF THE PAST

López Obrador swept to victory in 2018 on the promise of eradicating corruption and inequality after Peña Nieto’s presidency, marked by the disappearance of the 43 Ayotzinapa students and several corruption scandals.

Despite the discredit of his government, Peña Nieto had the parliamentary support of both PAN and PRD to approve the major reforms of his mandate, thanks to an agreement called Pact for Mexico.

“This generated a vision that there was no difference between the three [parties]. The electorate was polarized between supporting López Obrador or more of the same,” said Martha Singer, a political scientist at UNAM.

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After their heavy defeat in 2018, these parties have not built clear leadership to overshadow a still popular López Obrador, who takes advantage of his daily morning press conferences to discredit the opposition, despite being prohibited from meddling in the campaign.

Nor was the opposition helped by the denunciation of former Pemex director Emilio Lozoya, who last year implicated a good part of the former political elite in the Odebrecht bribery scheme.

According to the polls, Morena could suffer some attrition after the Covid-19 pandemic, which has placed Mexico as the fourth country in number of deaths. Still, it would keep its majority, when working together with its partner parties.

But the PRI secretary-general maintains that the coalition has presented “very competitive” candidates and predicts that it will retain at least half of the 15 states at stake after having made “self-criticism”. “We have expelled many comrades who have betrayed our principles,” Viggiano explained.

In addition, she has opened the door to forming a similar coalition in the 2024 presidential elections, when López Obrador’s term in office will end.

“Leaderships are not invented overnight. The opposition has failed to understand this, and they have been separated from the publics from below for years. As long as they continue like this, they will continue to fail”, warned analyst Singer.