At 7 a.m. on December 3, 2018, Andrés Manuel López Obrador started his first morning conferenceSince then, it has accumulated more than 1,430 broadcasts, each one resonating from Monday to Friday through YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and even Spotify podcasts.
This scenario, according to specialists consulted by EL DEBATE, has given him control of the media narrativeallowing him to outline political sides and even extol the ideals of the 4T with a voice that has become omnipresent in the social fabric.
About politics and music
In this space also known as the “morning”, Lopez Obrador and his cabinet They have reported weekly security reports, food and gasoline prices, welfare programs, migration actions and their daily actions.
The conference has also had sections in defense of the right of reply. Such as “Who is who in the lies of the week”, where every Wednesday, Ana Elizabeth García Vilchis replies to the media, journalists, columnists or various political actors, their statements about the actions of the López Obrador government or even about her personal life.
The most watched conference on YouTube had 3 million 683 thousand 565 views. There, López Obrador spoke about the extradition of Javier Duarte, the National Rifle Association in the United States and closed with the song La muralla, by Chico Che.
Line
Kevin Zapata Celestino, an expert in political communication and social research, stood out in Interview for EL DEBATE that the conferences are not aimed at media and journalists, but rather they sought to connect directly with the people, and in that sense, he stressed that it could be said that really Lopez Obrador achieved his goal, with popularity and political mobilization.
However, Zapata Celestino analyzed that communication has been strictly unidirectional, that is, from President of the Republic towards the audiences. “The president is the one who establishes the terms in which public affairs are discussed, and the rest of the political and social actors react to his speech. It is not a circular dialogue, and the “morning press conferences” are precisely designed so that the president’s voice prevails over the issues of interest and over the rest of the actors who could also have a say in this regard,” he said.
The professor at the London School of Economics and Political Science in London also analyzed that the president’s famous “other data” became an easy way out when he was questioned by critical journalists, often using the government’s own data, clearly showing that it was not really a space of transparency or accountability.
Can
Jerry Jáuregui, an expert in political marketing, added that rarely in the political history of mexico We have never seen a president take the lead in communication as naturally and successfully as López Obrador.
“Whether we like it or not, the famous “morning press conferences” marked not only his term in office, but also the daily narrative of the country. From very early on, the president was in charge of drawing up the media agenda and defining what would be talked about for the rest of the day in every corner of the country,” he said.
The specialist explained that for six years, the morning shows were his main tool to connect with citizens, without filters and at his own pace. This was true regardless of where he was, because he would travel with his morning show to other states.
In Jerry Jáuregui’s opinion, it was not a question of excessive communication; on the contrary, he stressed that his style was always precise, strategic and, yes, consistent. “It was never just about informing, but about generating a powerful narrative that he mastered like few others,” he said.
Far from saturating, he added that Lopez Obrador He knew when and how to intervene in national conversations, with a style so distinctive that it was impossible to ignore him. According to Jerry Jáuregui, today more than ever, it is worth questioning how current leaders are communicating and who is really controlling the narrative. He stressed that if he taught anything AMLOit is not enough to govern, but you have to know how to communicate it, and do so with a touch of genius.
Sides
But from the “morning” there were also conflicts or criticisms of the opposition parties and their representatives, such as the presidential candidate Xochitl GalvezFor Kevin Zapata Celestino, an expert in political communication and social research, the president’s quarrelsome line of discourse had the clear purpose of politically mobilizing audiences. He analyzed that the president, by dividing into good and bad, as he himself said “without half measures,” forced audiences to identify with a side, and based on the created narrative, the sides were clear: the corrupt neoliberals and their institutions or the followers of the Fourth Transformation who seek the renewal of the country. “In this sense, for the presidential speech to be effective, social tension was necessary,” said Zapata Celestino.
He said that the moral of the story, according to the narrative created by the president, is that if Mexico is to be rescued, it is necessary to blindly support the Fourth Transformation project.
Agenda
Raúl Olmedo Neri, an expert in political science and communication, added that the morning conferences also have as a fundamental feature the elimination or annihilation of media intermediaries in the exercise of accountability and transparency surrounding the actions taken by the government.
He added that they show a capacity to intervene in the national media agenda because this project transcends the content of some media outlets. “In general terms, the morning press conference also served as the construction of a space for debate not on the issues, but on who was talking about those issues, that is, the government on the one hand and the media companies on the other,” explained Olmedo Neri.
In turn, the UNAM academic analyzed that this is an important element because the Morena project headed by Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador ended up intervening in the media narrative of private consortia or conglomerates in the country.
Sheinbaum
The next president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, announced that she will continue with the daily format of the morning conferences starting at 7 a.m. after the meeting with the Security Cabinet, which will be at 6 a.m.
Kevin Zapata Celestino, an expert in political communication and social research, analyzed that Claudia Sheinbaum Sheinbaum has a completely different profile than López Obrador. She stressed that she is an upper-middle-class woman, well-educated, with a more stoic character, and therefore it is difficult for her profile to fit the “down-to-earth” behavior and speech that the president maintained in his morning press conferences. Therefore, she opined that if Sheinbaum wants to maintain a successful communication scheme, she will have to adjust the format of the conferences to her unique profile; otherwise, there may be a serious dissonance between the image of the new president and the content of her messages, which could seriously undermine her credibility.
Textual
The ‘morning press conferences’ are designed so that the president’s voice prevails over matters of interest.”
Kevin Zapata Celestino
Expert in political communication
Whether we like it or not, the famous ‘morning press conferences’ marked not only his six-year term, but also the daily narrative of the country.”
Jerry Jauregui
Expert in political communication
It is a governmental space created for the dissemination, confrontation and denunciation of the actions carried out by the government.”
Raul Olmedo Neri
Political science expert
Moments to remember
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