Mexico heads for new era under new leader
MEXICO CITY — Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador was scheduled to be sworn in as Mexico’s next president on Saturday, as the country seeks a new direction under the left-wing politician.
The man widely known as “AMLO” won Mexico’s July 1 elections in a landslide, and his coalition — led by the party he founded four years ago, Morena — took strong majorities in both houses of Congress.
It was the biggest win for any president, and the first for a leftist, since Mexico transitioned to a multi-party system in 2000.
As the sharp-tongued, silver-haired leader prepares to slip on the presidential sash for a six-year term, the question is: what will he do with that mandate?
Lopez Obrador, 65, has vowed to deliver “transformation” to the country, as he inherits a sticky set of problems from his predecessor, Enrique Pena Nieto.
They include endemic corruption, gruesome violence fueled by Mexico’s war on drug cartels, and the caravan of 6,000 Central American migrants camped at the US-Mexican border — not to mention the minefield that diplomacy with Mexico’s giant northern neighbor has become under US President Donald Trump.
Facing crises on multiple fronts, Lopez Obrador is promising a presidency like no other in Mexican history.
He has forsworn the presidential residence, the presidential jet, more than half the presidential salary and the presidential security detail, promising to lead his anti-corruption, pro-austerity charge by example.
But critics fear his government will be one of radicalism. The business world is particularly nervous: The Mexican peso and stocks have plunged since the election.
However, the former Mexico City mayor has not lost his popular support. His approval rating is 66 percent, according to a poll published on Monday by the newspaper El Financiero.
Then there is the tricky matter of Trump.
The US president took a tough stance with the Pena Nieto government with his vows to make Mexico pay for a wall on the border and brinkmanship in negotiating an updated trade deal between the United States, Mexico and Canada — which was expected to be signed the day before Lopez Obrador takes office.
A warm start
So far, Lopez Obrador and Trump have gotten off to a warm start. Trump said they had a “great talk” after the election.
But Trump is pressuring Lopez Obrador on immigration, pushing a deal to keep asylum-seeking migrants in Mexico while their claims are processed in the US.
The day after the inauguration, Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard was expected to meet US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in Washington for talks on the issue.
“The policies coming out of Washington are putting Lopez Obrador in a very difficult situation,” said Pamela Starr of the University of Southern California.
“That said, while Trump has bashed the migrant caravan, ... he has never bashed Lopez Obrador. That gives me pause to think that potentially the two of them might be able to work something out.”
On Thursday, a handful of the thousands of Central American migrants camped out at the US-Mexican border waiting to plead their case for asylum in the US launched a hunger strike to protest the Mexican police blocking their way.
Members of the caravan have been sleeping outdoors, on cold floors or on mats in an overcrowded shelter since they arrived in Tijuana across the border from San Diego, California, three weeks ago. Mexican immigration authorities on Thursday began transporting some of the migrants via buses to a new shelter to help lessen the strain.