Andrés Manuel López Obrador, during a press conference at the National Palace.Europa Press
Contrary to popular belief, I maintain that President Andrés Manuel López Obrador is a Democrat, even though he is a disguised Democrat. His severe verbal attacks against the autonomous institutions, the judges or the press, in reality, are not accompanied by a popular mobilization, invented fiscal interventions, some unilateral prohibition, let alone an act of repression. Certainly the president has tried, as did his predecessors, to impose, bend or neutralize the other powers to expand the margins of the Executive and thereby the achievement of their projects. The big difference is that AMLO does it in an open, raucous and verbally bellicose way.
It tends to be ignored that previous presidents slapped the “democratic” bodies as much as they could, perhaps because they did so while making hypocritical speeches about respecting the sacrosanct institutions. Felipe Calderón and Enrique Peña Nieto mobilized their parties to get representatives in the INE, formerly IFE, in clear betrayal of the autonomy of the electoral referee that they swore to respect. These leaders also sought a Supreme Court as a way, or how to understand to convert a Cabinet member like Eduardo Medina Mora into a minister? The raspy expressions that AMLO addresses to Coneval, INEGI or any other independent body may irritate when their reports contravene his "other data", but they are as much or more serious acts as that of José Antonio Meade, the "honest and modern" former secretary of Tax authorities,who imposed on an employee, who did not meet the requirements, as a counselor of INEGI.
López Obrador has sent the institutions to hell, but has ultimately respected them over and over again in decisive moments. In 2006, after officially losing by 0.5% of the votes, but convinced that he had been the victim of fraud, he peacefully channeled the acts of protest. In his eyes there could be no greater grievance than being illegally stripped of the presidency, and yet he kept at bay the radical impulses of the many who demanded a severe or even violent response.
This week he is reacting in the same way at a time when courts and instances parallel to the federal government have beaten his projects. The electoral court definitively canceled the candidacies of those elected by Morena to the governorships of Guerrero and Michoacán and eliminated the possibility of future overrepresentations of the majority party in the chambers. The first has a more emotional than political scope, because Morena is in a position to win with the candidates who replace the sanctioned ones; but the latter severely affects the long-awaited objective of reaching qualified majorities to achieve the legal changes required by the consolidation of Q4.
And yet, on Wednesday morning, he categorically asked to abide by the law. “Despite this grievance, I invite all the citizens of Guerrero and Michoacán to move forward, to continue participating, not to become demoralized, because these coups also have the purpose of demoralizing us, discouraging us. No, you have to move forward. It must also, I emphasize, respect the verdict, the sentence, because we have to bet on democracy and an act like yesterday's, arbitrary, has an additional component: it is an act of provocation and what they want is to subvert the legal order , peace, tranquility. So, don't get hooked, don't fall for the provocation, accept the result, substitute candidates and move on, but don't fall for the provocation of confrontation and violence, keep fighting peacefully ”.
His statements have merit because he has pointed out that when law and justice are opposed, the ethical thing is to act with justice. And although he surely considers it unfair to eliminate his candidates, he decides to submit to the law. It seems to me that, despite the repeated accusation that López Obrador has received from his critics of being an authoritarian and even despotic man, at important junctures the president has opted for respect for the legal framework. Despite his verbal aggressiveness, he is a responsible politician who tries to change through peaceful means and institutional means a regime that he considers unjust.
It should not be forgotten that AMLO comes to power as an expression of broad sectors irritated with the current order. There is an increasingly exasperated rough Mexico that has been expressing itself in an increasingly exalted way: from communities willing to take justice into their own hands (lynchings or self-armed guards) to actions of spontaneous looting, blockades and invasions. There was a risk that López Obrador would use ideological alibis to undertake a regime change with drastic measures, presumably justified by social reasons. And yet, it has moved according to the institutional framework, even when it does not agree with a good part of its operation or its legitimacy. And that, precisely, is another way of defining a democrat.
There is a brave and resentful Mexico, I insist, and the fact that for the first time it had a representative in the National Palace could have translated into a rapturous and captivating attitude. So far the only thing really taken away from López Obrador have been his phrases. Its initiatives or decisions in budgetary matters may be the subject of controversy in public opinion, but they respond to the areas of its competence and it has done so through the legal framework. And for the rest with the legitimate and political backing of a majority vote calling for a change. Nothing that another government cannot, also within its powers, untie if it has political and social support.
Beyond the dusty public debate, in which both parties do not spare epithets and disqualifications, what is underway is an attempt at regime change in response to Mexico's problems.
It may have successes and failures, but, contrary to what is said, so far it has been a peaceful and responsible reform.
@jorgezepedap
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