Tweet
Mexico’s President-elect, Enrique Peña Nieto, has directed police to build barricades around the San Lázaro Legislative Palace in advance of his December 1 inauguration there, in case of civil unrest.
In July, Peña Nieto, the candidate of the Partido Revolucionario Institucional, won the presidential election against his left-wing opponent, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, by 6.6 points, according to the official vote count. The announcement of Peña Nieto’s victory was immediately followed by a challenge to the election’s legitimacy. Lopez Obrador called the result “fraudulent,” accusing the PRI of buying at least 1 million votes and of exceeding the campaign finance limit. The PRI has a long history of corruption, repression and hegemonic one-party rule in Mexico.
In September, Lopez Obrador announced that he was stepping away from party politics to form a new political youth movement called “Morena,” dedicated to “peaceful civil resistance” to the new regime.
In May, in the middle of the campaign season, a student-based democratization movement called “Yo Soy 132″ emerged, which carried out repeated national mass protests in opposition to the PRI, Peña Nieto’s candidacy, and the media bias in favor of both. Yo Soy 132 was distrustful not only of the PRI’s authoritarian history, but of Peña Nieto’s conduct as Governor of the State of Mexico, where he oversaw a brutal crackdown on protesters who had blocked a highway in support of flower vendors who had been harassed by police. Two protesters were killed in the confrontation, and the police who carried out the crackdown are being investigated for allegedly molesting and raping 26 women.
Yo Soy 132 joined Lopez Obrador in contesting the election result after the vote count.
Presently, the government is bracing for further unrest. Oaxaca-born blogger Lorenzo Tlacaelel Lambertino writes:
Popular resistance continues unchecked against the president-elect Enrique Peña Nieto, who is perceived to have come into power through illegitimate means. In response to perceived threats from ‘radical groups,’ the state has barricaded off a 1.5 km. sector of the city surrounding the Legislative Palace in Sán Lázaro, in preparation for Peña Nieto’s inauguration on December 1st.
At least five metro stations have been closed off to the public for this purpose since last Sunday, three of which were re-opened after massive public outcry. The wall has become an epicenter for the expression of public anger, with large numbers of posters and writings pasted on the wall since it started to go up last week. The wall will also be the rallying point for a massive protest organized by the student resistance movement @YoSoy132, set to begin on November 30th.
Follow Leighton on Twitter and at Dog Park Media.
Photos: Electrolado
6 Comments
Coming to a neighborhood near you.
Our oppressors are just as corrupt, and the masks are coming off.
Obama could stop it by taking “entitlement” cuts off the table, but he’s not on our side.
The masters think they can finesse oppression because hey, it’s working. And it does – until it doesn’t.
I’ve been in Mexico City during one of their “civil unrests” — regarding PEMEX. It was impressive — well-organized and massive. Unlike Americans our friends south of the border know how to enlist the masses to civilly unrest — bless ‘em.
Oh, I forgot, Americans do everything better. Not.
These photos remind me of recent stories from about protests in Argentina and Chile. Not to get all Daily Worker, but is there any connection? Are the South American protests more visible in Mexico City than in the adamantly non-spanish speaking American media?
Thing is, Peña Nieto did steal the election. I live here in México and I saw how he did it. It is no secret–it was extensively reported upon in Proceso magazine during the entire election process. Right here in my little town people were paid 500MXP (that is around 45 dollars) to go vote for the PRI. A bus was even brought for them. Other people I know were told by their employers to get ten IFE cards (that is the Voter ID card Mexican citizens use as their primary identification card) for Peña Nieto or be fired from their jobs. Lopéz Obrador “lost” just like he did six years ago against Calderón. A bunch of right wing business men backed Peña Nieto and also he had the support of Televisa. Polls were skewed–reporting was slanted–the whole nasty and very usual business was done to steal the election. People here are so poor that their vote can be bought by giving them a meal or some cheap junk. And generally folks here are ignorant and that is the way PAN and PRI like it. PRI/PAN is only interested in POWER. They do not care at all about how miserable and poor the citizenry becomes, as long as they can get into power to enrich themselves and their cronies. Sound a little like the Republican Party in the U.S.?
PRI and Peña Nieto are making a big deal out of nothing around this supposed threat to peace and order during the Peña Nieto inauguration. There is NO THREAT–Lopéz Obrador is a peaceful man, and his supporters are not stupid. But if PRI can make the public perceive a threat, or even make a threat happen through a false flag operation, then no matter how non-existent the threat from MORENA, PRD or PT might be, the repression that follows the inauguration can be described as necessary. Fascists always work this way.
Americans had better start getting smart about what is going on down here in the yard of their next-door neighbor, especially since American dollars and the stupid American drug war are causing so much damage here, but that is anther story, and this is running long.
American Right wing Operatives were involved in the Calderon election fraud. Were they similarly involved this time?
When we think our elections have been stolen, we just post about it.