Mexican labor boss charged with graft
MEXICO CITY — Union leader Elba Esther Gordillo became one of Mexico’s most f lamboyant and powerful political operators, displaying her opulence openly with designer clothes and bags.
For years, the 68-yearold ex-school teacher beat back attacks from dissidents, political foes and rivals who have seen her as a symbol of Mexico’s old-style corrupt politics.
Rivals long accused her of corruption, misuse of union funds and even a murder. But prosecutors had never brought a charge against her until this week, when she was arrested and accused of embezzling $160 million in union funds to pay for everything from a house in San Diego and plastic surgery procedures to her Neiman Marcus bill.
Gordillo was detained as she landed at the Toluca airport near Mexico City on a private plane from San Diego and was whisked away by authorities.
Born in the impoverished southern state of Chiapas, Gordillo at age 15 joined the National Education Workers Union, then considered a sort of electoral army for the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, which governed Mexico for 71 years. She followed the path of most Mexican politicians, rising through a series of union, party and government posts. She was a senator for the PRI and also served in Mexico’s lower house.
The union post made her one of the most powerful figures in the PRI at a moment when democratic reforms were starting to erode the party’s hold on power, as well as its unquestioning subservience to Mexico’s president.
Even before the PRI lost the 2000 election to the National Action Party’s Vicente Fox, Gordillo began hedging her bets. She was the guiding force behind the creation of the New Alliance Party, which was based on members of the teacher’s union and was once headed by one of her daughters.
She participated in a high-profile discussion group that included prominent social activists and opponents of the government, including Fox, and her friendship with him infuriated some PRI officials. She was expelled from the party a year later.