Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán Loera, the Mexican drug trafficker who led the Sinaloa cartel and was sentenced to life imprisonment in the United States, had his and cartel representatives in past governments, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador accused today.
López Obrador said in his morning press conference that in past administrations of the Mexican government there were clearly official links with the Sinaloa cartel. "All these characters are enriched overnight," said the president, and "where did [houses] and houses come from?"
López Obrador, or AMLO, made specific reference to the allegations that figures such as Genaro García Luna, former secretary of federal public security during the government of Felipe Calderón (2006-2012), accepted bribes from drug trafficking groups. Garcia Luna was arrested in early December in Texas and is pending a trial in New York on charges of overlapping drug traffickers.
"It's not that Guzmán Loera was here at the Palace or in Los Pinos," AMLO said, naming the current and former presidential headquarters. "But he had representatives in the government, " he added.
"We cannot allow crime to govern, because that is to govern," said the Mexican president.
This week López Obrador also suggested that 'El Chapo' came to have "the same power as the president" in previous governments, to argue that those times are over and that there must now be unity among Mexicans to improve the security situation.
The famous leaks and recaptures of this drug dealer contributed to the suspicions that he was protected from power; however, he ended up being extradited to the United States, where he was sentenced to life imprisonment.
Guzmán escaped in 2001 from a maximum security prison in Jalisco, during the government of PAN Vicente Vicente (2000-2006). He was recaptured in 2014 under the administration of PRI Enrique Peña Nieto (2012-2018). He escaped again in July 2015 and was recaptured for the second time in January 2016.
Although the current crisis of violence in Mexico has many causes, the showy clashes with armed groups - also called 'cartels' - such as the one in Culiacán last October have captured the attention of Mexican and international media.
2019 closed as the bloodiest year in the history of Mexico since there are records: as of November 40,663 homicides had been reported in the country, an increase of 8% compared to the same period of 2018, which had already broken records of violence . The municipality of Tecomán, in Colima, was the most violent in the whole country.
In these early days of 2020 there have already been shootings in Nuevo Laredo and violent quarrels in a Zacatecas prison.
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