mexico News-May 12

Posted by The Generals on May 13, 2011, 12:35 am
206.116.64.118

Subject: Mexico News May 12, 2011 LatinNews Daily - 12 May 2011 Pressure mounts on Mexico’s García Luna Development: On 11 May, the Partido de la Revolución Democrática (PRD), the smallest of the three main parties in congress, announced that today (12 May) it will formally accuse Genaro García Luna, the public security minister, of corruption. Significance: García Luna is already under pressure after Javier Sicilia, the successful organiser of a widely supported demonstration against the government’s failing security policies, called for the security minister to go. The murder statistics are also moving against Garciá Luna: after a lull in the first quarter, the gangster murder rate has shot up again and is on course to exceed last year’s 11,583. Key points: • The PRD’s allegation is that García Luna authorised the use of public money for a TV programme, El Equipo, which showed him personally in a good light. This programme went out every night this week at 10pm on Channel 2. • Sicilia is a Roman Catholic poet who accused the government’s failing security polices for the kidnapping and murder of his son (and six other youngsters) in Cuernavaca at the end of March. Sicilia organised a march from Cuernavaca to Mexico City which culminated in a massive rally in the Zócalo on 8 May. Sicilia called for García Luna to be sacked but, despite this call, met President Felipe Calderón Hinojosa at his residence on 9 May. Other leading political figures are manoeuvring to secure Sicilia’s endorsement, which could be important in the 2012 elections. • The murder rate has kicked up to 300 a week, according to Reforma’s ‘Ejecutómetro’. On 11 May, 15 people, including two policemen, were gunned down by gangsters in and around Monterrey. On top of this, the number of bodies found in five mass graves at Colonia Valle del Guadiana, Durango, has increased to 196, which exceeds the previous record of 183 found in mass graves in San Fernando, Tamaulipas. ************* LatinNews Daily - 12 May 2011 Ebrard and López Obrador to debate Development: On 11 May, Mexico's two main left-wing presidential candidates for 2012, Marcelo Ebrard (mayor of Mexico City) and Andrés Manuel López Obrador (who lost the 2006 presidential election), moved closer to holding at least two debates and a primary. Significance: The big question is whether the loser will accept the result of the primary. If that happens -especially if Ebrard, the less radical of the two, wins-, the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI)’s candidate for the presidency, Enrique Peña Nieto, may find himself in a race for the presidency. Key points: • The two candidates themselves have yet to sign up to what the three main left-wing parties -the Partido de la Revolución Democrática, the Partido del Trabajo and Convergencia- agreed. The candidates are likely to agree, since both men have been personally close: Ebrard backed López Obrador in his protests against the 2006 election result. • Presumably the debates and primary will take place this year. The elections will be held on 1 July 2012.

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