The Mexican Government reported that at least 15 candidates for the June 2 elections have been murdered for political reasons. However, independent organizations show figures higher than those provided by the Administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, which promised protection to any candidate who requests it.
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The Government of Mexico, chaired by Andrés Manuel López Obrador, reported that at least 15 candidates for the June 2 elections have been murdered. The president, aware that the insecurity situation has spread throughout the country and the candidates are paying for it with his life, has reiterated his commitment to the protection of applicants.
“We are committed to protecting candidates for the different popularly elected positions, that is why there is work, a plan to protect them and to have a presence of the National Guard in those areas where there is a problem of insecurity,” he said.
The Government points out that more than 100 requests for protection have been received. Rosa Icela Rodríguez, Secretary of Security and Citizen Protection, has expressed that not all requests are approved: “Until April 1 we have 108 protection requests86 of which have been treated, 10 were declined and 12 are in risk analysis.”
The requests, he specified, include the three candidates for the Presidency, seven candidates for governor, 27 for the Senate and 71 for deputies.
As detailed, of the 15 victims counted – a figure that Mexico publishes for the first time – only two had already registered as official candidates, five were pre-candidates and eight were applicants. The last murdered was the candidate of the ruling Morena party (left) for the Municipal Presidency (city council) of Celaya (Guanajuato).
Read alsoMexico: the murder of a local candidate exacerbates the security crisis within the electoral process
distribution of blame
The last fatality was Gisela Gaytán, Morena candidate for the Celaya city council, belonging to the state of Guanajuato. Attacked with bullets in the middle of the street, she herself had reported hours before that she had requested protection. With which, a question emerged in Mexican society: Who protects a local candidate?
The state and federal authorities accuse each other. While the National Guard and the Army must provide protection to high-level candidates (governorships, deputies, Senate and Presidency), It is the local security agencies that are in charge of the security of the candidates for deputations, mayors and councilors.provided that the National Electoral Institute requests this protection from the same electoral body in the corresponding locality.
In the case of Gaytán, who requested protection in March, the process was carried out, but the Guanajuato Electoral Institute declined the request because the campaigns officially began on March 31. The candidate was murdered on April 1 without any protection.
The figures differ
For independent organizations, the 15 murders recognized by the Government are figures that fall short. The consulting firm Data Int counts 28 murdered, while Data Cívica reported 10 in the first two months of 2024 and 11 in the second half of 2023.
As for the Think Tank Electoral Laboratorythe count reaches 51 murders in the electoral process between 2023 and 2024. His count details the date of the murder and what the role of the candidate was: among the victims there are also party advisors, collaborators and even relatives of candidates, so his count shows that the objectives go beyond the candidates. .
The organization warns that “this electoral process has already exceeded the number of candidates for a candidacy, pre-candidates or candidates murdered in the 2018 process.”
NGOs also confirm that violence associated with the elections has had an increasing trend, according to their own records: “In 2018 there were 43 murders related to electoral violenceof which 24 were pre-candidates or candidates and in 2021 there were 88 murders, of which 30 corresponded to pre-candidates or candidates.”
The June 2 elections will be the largest in Mexican history, with more than 20,000 elected positions and a still growing list of 70,000 candidates.
With EFE, Reuters and local media
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