Mexico News-Apr.12

Posted by the Generals on April 14, 2011, 11:20 pm
206.116.64.118

Subject: Mexico News DAILY April 12, 2011 LatinNews Daily - 12 April 2011 PRD backs Encinas for the Estado Development: On 11 April, the Partido de la Revolución Democrática (PRD)’s political committee threw its weight behind Alejandro Encinas as party candidate in the upcoming Estado de México elections. Significance: With Encinas as the prospective candidate of a PRD-led left-wing alliance, the picture in the important Estado elections is much clearer. The PRD’s endorsement of Encinas, the proposed candidate of radical party strongman Andrés Manuel López Obrador, comes days after the party voted against forming an electoral alliance with the right-wing national ruling Partido Acción Nacional (PAN) in the Estado, in a bid to unseat the incumbent Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI). Although the PRD party leadership is seen as moderate, it is clear that the party’s more radical faction still wields more influence internally. The latest decision is a blow for the incumbent Mexico City Mayor and PRD presidential hopeful for 2012, Marcelo Ebrad, who has been a main proponent of so-called ‘Stop the PRI’ alliances. Key points: • Tellingly, Encinas’s endorsement was first made public by the PRD secretary general, Dolores Padierna, and not by the party president, Jesús Zambrano. Unlike Zambrano, a moderate closely allied to Ebrard, Padierna is a veteran party militant, closely identified with López Obrador. • Pending Encinas’s acceptance by the other members of the left-wing alliance, the identity of all three major gubernatorial candidates is now known. The PAN endorsed its proposed consensus candidate, Luis Bravo Mena, on 10 April, after the PRD voted against an electoral alliance with PAN. In choosing President Felipe Calderón’s former private secretary Bravo Mena over the popular PAN congress leader, Josefina Vázquez Mota, the embattled and weakened PAN is perhaps signalling that it is already resigned to a defeat. It may also want to save Vázquez Mota for a future candidacy, perhaps even for the 2012 race. •The PRI selected its candidate, Eruviel Avila, a well known popular local politician, on 27 March. The PRI endorsed Avila over more well connected members of the Grupo Atlacomulco family clan, such as Alfredo del Mazo Maza, perhaps showing that it’s prepared to ignore hierarchy and tradition in order to secure a crucial electoral win and thereby consolidate the outgoing Estado governor Enrique Peña Nieto’s bid for the presidency. All three candidates to succeed Peña Nieto will now begin their campaigns in earnest, ahead of the 3 July vote.

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