Update on Andrés Manuel López Obrador

Article written by Diego Merino

Desafuero Protest

Early in April, the Mexican Congress voted 360 to 127 to strip
Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the mayor of Mexico City, of his political
immunity. It remains unclear whether Mr. López Obrador will be able to
run for President in the 2006 elections, but since the vote in
Congress, there have been several developments in his favor.

It was a predominantly party-line vote, in which the
Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) sided with President Vicente
Fox’s National Action Party (PAN) to vote against Mr. López Obrador of
the left-wing Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD). (See March Analysis)

Enormous
peaceful protests have convened in Mexico City, with supporting rallies
around the country, to support Mr. López Obrador. Two separate protests
have each drawn hundreds of thousands of people gathered to Zócalo,
Mexico City’s central square, to show their opposition to Congress’s
decision. Also encouraging for Mr. López Obrador is that his support in
the polls for the Presidential race has risen from around 30% before
the desafuero to around 45%, and that 60% of Mexicans oppose Congress’s decision to strip him of his immunity.

On April 25th he returned to work as mayor, and on April 27th, Mr.
Fox announced that he had accepted the resignation of his own Attorney
General, Rafael Macedo de la Concha, who had led the legal fight
against Mr. López Obrador. The resignation appears to be an olive
branch to the Mexico City mayor—in his speech, Mr. Fox said that he
wanted to guarantee that the 2006 elections would be free and fair.

On May 3rd, La Jornada
reported that the office of the President has confided that it is
seeking a legal way for Mr. López Obrador to regain his immunity and be
eligible to run for President. The two leaders, Mr. Fox and Mr. López
Obrador, will meet later this week in order to attempt to resolve their
differences.

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