 |
Add to My Group
A Nation on the Brink - Mexico's July 5 Legislative Elections
By Michael Collins (about the author) Page 2 of 3 page(s)
Voto Nulo: Voting this way nullifies your ballot. The null ballot total becomes the total vote for those who reject the dominant parties and the electoral institutions.
PRD. The Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) has a different take on the war on drugs and the economy. A key PRD leader in the Senate called for the legalization of recreational drugs that fuel the war on drugs. The party has also shied away from supporting the use of the Army in street battles with drug cartel gunmen.
PRD is the only party that has attempted to chart a broad-based, well defined socio-economic program. Before the 2006 Presidential campaign, PRD candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador assembled a team of experts to prepare an economic operating plan for Mexico. The plan included items such as mandatory reductions in the federal budget, negotiated cutbacks in entitlement programs such as social security and pensions, and reform of PeMex, as well as a program of educational and infrastructural investments.
After losing the controversial election in 2006, PRD presidential candidate AMLO outlined his vision for Mexican development. He included input from the six month's of protests in Mexico City after the July 2006 election, and attempted to implement the project by a coalition in the Congress. A later collapse of the coalition, as well as political infighting, quashed implementation of this program and left the PRD in a tenuous position for future elections.
PRD is expected to lose forty of its 126 seats in the Chamber of Deputies
PRI. The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) ruled Mexico from 1929 through 2000. Its rule has been characterized both by socialist and leftist tendencies, and the enforcement of a command economy with heavy traces of crony capitalism and tight controls over access to media, capital, public services -- and political office. Under such a "one-party" system, the PRI typically gained 75% of the vote. During a forty year period, PRI accomplished the "Mexican Miracle," which increased economic production six fold while the population only doubled.
The PRI has frequently been criticized as "wishy washy" in the war on drugs. PRI has advocated better implementation of law and policy. At the same time, the party has criticized for possibly having deep ties to the cartels trafficking in narcotics.
Economically, it is difficult to understand PRI's platform or approach. It's also hard to tell how the voters see PRI's economic policy. Historically, the PRI fell from influence during pressures for openings for foreign development of the Mexican economic system. More specifically, the party took the blame for the post-1988 failures of US-led "open market" economics. Yet PRI remains a party closely identified by many with the nation itself.
Pre election polls strongly suggest that the PRI will be the biggest apparent "winner" on Sunday, more than doubling its current 106 seats in the Chamber of Deputies.
"Nullification!?!" A forth major candidate on July 5 will be "voto nulo," (null vote). Voters are urged to deliberately void their ballot to cast a vote of "no confidence." The recipients are those who run a political system that continually fails to accomplish anything. The "null" option has also been described as the best statement possible of disillusionment and distrust with the electoral system and institutions. Voto nulo is the sleeper in this election (see part 3 of this series on Election Day). It's was pegged at 11% in a poll just reported on June 30th.
The July 5th elections will choose the 500 members of the Mexican Chamber of Deputies. Voters in 11 states plus the Federal District will elect governors. Within those states and the Federal District, 565 mayors will be elected.
What challenges will the winners face?
Mexicans are watching a "dirty war" fought in their streets, parks, and resorts. At the same time, the citizens are the victims of that war. The war is a PAN invention that models the U.S. war on drugs.
There are some important differences. The PAN government is more than willing to fight cartel gunmen on the streets. In the last two months, 18 were killed in an Acapulco shootout and 53 cartel gunmen were freed form a Mexican jail with no resistance. Drug lords competing for territory in the cocaine transit trade are kidnapping members of opposing gangs, decapitating them, and sharing the videos for an unfathomable purpose. The nation is peering into the abyss and may see a narcostate emerge soon without effective opposition. Slaughtering cartel gunmen on the streets has failed.
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author
and do not necessarily reflect those of this website or its editors.
 Contact Author |
Contact Editor |
 View Authors' Articles |
by Catherine Shaw
$37.50
Lowest New Price $24.75
Number of pages: 448
Publisher: Westview Press
by Costas Panagopoulos
$25.95
Lowest New Price $23.35
Number of pages: 296
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
by Steven A. Seidman
$33.95
Number of pages: 360
Publisher: Peter Lang Publishing
by Ronald A. Faucheux
$49.95
Lowest New Price $25.07
Number of pages: 674
Publisher: M. Evans and Company, Inc.
| No comments |
Want to post your own comment on this Article? 
|
||||
|
||||||||||||||
Must Read (0) 
Well Said (0) 
News (0) 
Touching (0) 
Funny (0) 
Supported (0) 
Interesting (0) 
Inspiring (0) 
Valuable (0) Tell a Friend:
|
Copyright © 2002-2009, OpEdNews |
