ANDRES MANUEL LÓPEZ OBRADOR: ONE FLEW OVER THE COO-COO’S NEST

Indeed, the former mayor of Mexico City had it all. It certainly is traumatic when you almost had the most powerful seat in the country and it slips away.

Sure, AMLO argues that fraud did him in. However, as he often does, he has failed to show proof that such acts really happened, relying instead on the overwhelming distrust that the Mexican voter has regarding fraud (seven decades of the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) will do that).

The Instituto Federal Electoral (IFE) is one of the most efficient and modern electoral institutions in the world (not my opinion). The elections were carried out fairly and professionally.

Sure, there are always human errors here and there, but the small margin that AMLO is using as his most potent argument does not ring true: In Mexico fraud is not commited based on a few extra votes. Traditionally it was done with a clear and huge margin in favor of the “official candidate.”

If fraud was committed, the Partido Accion Nacional (PAN) certainly was very bad at it. First for allowing so many of the opposition to win office in the Mexican Congress, which in turn would give a hell of a time to Felipe Calderon as president, but above all, the gargantuan and powerful Mexico City was won by the PRD, AMLO’s party.

AMLO, a former PRIista, did not manage his image or words with dignity and smartness. He also did not show respect for the law and the institutions that as president he would have directed. The opposition exploited these severe faults and now he is angry that he lost. AMLO, welcome to Politics 101.

Not even the now irrelevant and fellow leftist Zapatistas supported him. Nowhere in Mexico, save the capital, were there protests over Felipe Calderon’s winning the presidency. Only Mexico City, where AMLO was its immediate former mayor and where the PRD is strong.

Mexico is attempting to become a modern democracy and little by little is gaining some small victories. The rule of law, unfortunately, has not been a strong point in Mexican society and hopefully, Calderon can bring some momentum into the judicial system. However he has a huge task that it is difficult to accomplish in 6 years. Nonetheless, everyone expects that he gets the corruption, drug trafficking, illegal immigration, unemployment and the rule of the law on the right track.

This is too much to ask (since the US manages the other half of some of these topics) but we will see how much he can achieve or if he will become a lame duck president as Vicent Fox eventually became in the middle of his term.

He will need to negotiate better with the PRD and PRI in Congress in order to push reforms through.
Good luck, Felipe.