Next year Mexico will have a female president at the head of the country. Even though it is surprising, it is no less predictable. Almost no one doubts anymore, despite the vicissitudes that politics brings, that Claudia Sheinbaum or Xóchitl Gálvez will take over the reins of power. The third candidate would be the Citizen Movement, still undetermined, but few experts believe that the young trajectory of this party and its recent setbacks allow it to place anyone in the presidential chair. What remains to be determined, and several experts help us with this for this report, is in what terms an electoral campaign will unfold that will lead to the polls on June 2 in the largest elections known to date due to the number of positions at stake. . What will be the political attitude of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador in his last year in office and how will he be judged by his six-year term? And what will happen to the economy, one of the keys to any political campaign, which today shows its best prospects in more than a decade.
Vanessa Romero Rocha believes that the electoral campaign that will begin in March “will be a peaceful contest,” at least if compared to previous ones where the economic power, she says, “injected a lot of money into marketing against some candidate, for example, when Calderón, who spent 682 million pesos on campaign advertising.” Big businessmen are not dissatisfied today with the Government's economic policies, although some of them support the opposition, he says, “but the Business Coordinating Council, which injected 136.4 million in 2006, I do not believe that on this occasion it will act as a bloc. against Morena”, the ruling party.
Since it is about politics, and taking into account the polarization that has characterized this entire six-year term, there is no shortage of those who have the opposite opinion than the analyst Romero Rocha. “We are already seeing how the resources of the 23 states governed by Morena are allocated to the candidate Sheinbaum and that the federal government conditions social aid in favor of her campaign. And it is being a pre-campaign of a lot of disqualification,” says historian José Antonio Crespo. He accuses them of “doing the same thing that the PRI did in their day, controlling everything, the INE, the Electoral Tribunal,” to the point that the analyst does not doubt that the president will not accept defeat if the results are even in favor of one and the other contenders. “I don't think he recognizes the alternation, if necessary, he will fight by hook or by crook, with litigation, mobilizations. And that can put the stability of the country at risk,” says Crespo.
There is always something we agree on, even if it is for different reasons. Romero Rocha maintains that López Obrador will be “particularly belligerent” in his last year, “loud and scandalous.” “Because he will try to carry out the initiatives that cause the most controversy with the opposition, electoral, judicial, military reforms, extinction of autonomous organizations.” They are, in the opinion of Romero Rocha, “reasons of electoral strategy, to win votes in his party and because it is what he has done on previous occasions, for example when he stopped being head of government in Mexico City.” . In this way, he puts the criticism behind him and leaves the paved path behind him, “so that people receive Claudia as a break in the midst of the political struggle.”
Crespo has no doubt that López Obrador will be an intervener and protagonist of the campaign, but not for the reasons mentioned above, but because “his history of hitting democracy hard and because he is willing to do anything in order not to lose. If the opposition came to power they could find evidence of corruption from him or his children and that should worry him. The president is already fighting as if he were campaigning, violating the law, because he cannot intervene,” says the analyst.
Crespo does not take half measures. He believes that the Government “has not fulfilled anything it promised, neither in terms of poverty, nor health, nor corruption, nor security” and does not trust the surveys that are being published in which Sheinbaum obtains a clear advantage about Gálvez. The percentage of undecided people is still high, he says, it will be decisive. “Claudia, I think it doesn't reach 50%, maybe 40% or 45%, which is not little, but I think the result will be closer between the two than what purchased surveys say now,” he says.
However, there is a factor that is also determining among the population when choosing their ballot, the economy. And the data are some of the most promising that Mexico has had in a long time, according to international organizations. The weight in full sustained strength, strong investments, high salaries and the relocation of companies that favor it with the United States at its side, the aforementioned nearshoring. “In effect, the minimum wage has grown above inflation and there is more data that is relevant. “I would say that Mexico has a great opportunity to do things right, not like what happened in 1994 with the free trade agreement with the United States and Canada, NAFTA, when the industry was not helped with policies to flourish,” says the analyst. economic Viri Ríos. In her opinion, the candidates must understand this moment and expand the middle classes in the new six-year term as well as design strategies to take advantage of the good economic moment.
2024 will also be the year in which major public works will begin to roll out, the Mayan train, the transisthmian train, the new airports and highways. The president will be entitled to all of this. Ríos does not believe, however, that López Obrador will be remembered as the great transformer. Against him, he says, he has not been able to completely change the economy, for which better management in times of pandemic would have helped. “However, he opted for austerity and that was a mistake, otherwise the economy would have risen faster.” And two: “he has not undertaken tax reform to increase the resources available to the State to provide services,” analyzes Ríos.
Crespo summarizes the political legacy that will remain in the minds of citizens in a much more drastic way: “I wanted to look like Cárdenas and he won't even be on par with Echeverría, which is saying something,” he states emphatically.
Vanesa Romero Rocha greets this year as one of “good democratic balance, with strengthened institutions. She focuses interest, however, on the “probable disappearance of the PRI as a national party,” because she does not believe it will achieve registration. He believes that the votes for own political movements. She also believes that the PRD could lose its registration, both factors that would change the political landscape in Mexico completely, except when it comes to acronyms. On the other hand, Romero Rocha believes that 2024 may be the year in which Movimiento Ciudadano abandons its status as a hinge party to consolidate itself as an opposition party. “Given the disappearance of relevant formations, it has a golden opportunity,” says this analyst.
The other great political unknown that opens in 2024 is the electoral future of Mexico City, the most important square and one of those that offers the greatest doubts. In the capital, the 2024 midterm elections have already put a first brake on the left-wing majorities that have always characterized the city. The PAN and its allies, PRI and PRD, won some good mayoralties, including Cuauhtémoc, known as the capital within the capital, a good blow for the Morenista perspectives. Clara Brugada will now try to recover those voters for Morena and will have Santiago Taboada doing the same from the PAN. But everything is still very open in the city, given that the candidates for mayor and the votes they carry with them have not yet been decided.
The presidential race seems to offer more certainties. For those who do not guess the winning party correctly, you can always bet that 2024 will be the year in which citizens will decide that a woman directs, for the first time, the destinies of Mexico for the next six years.
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