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 News Around the Republic of Mexico | July 2005 
PRI Votes for Madrazo to Continue Post
 Chris Kraul - LA Times
| | Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) President Roberto Madrazo is gunning for his party's nomination to run in the 2006 presidential elections, while vowing to stay in his job until August. (Photo: AP) |
A year before the presidential election, this nation's oldest, most powerful party headed toward a destructive split, resulting from the bitter enmity between its top leaders probable presidential nominee Roberto Madrazo and teachers union leader Elba Esther Gordillo.
Madrazo was to have resigned Tuesday as the Institutional Revolutionary Party's (PRI) chief to campaign full time in next year's presidential election. But he delayed his move after the PRI leadership council voted unanimously Tuesday to ask him to stay on until early August.
That step by the council, which he controls, will keep Gordillo who, as general secretary, is the No. 2 party leader from taking Madrazo's place. Gordillo warned Madrazo over the weekend that any attempt to keep her from assuming the PRI presidency could cause a "rupture" in the party, according to published reports.
There was no immediate reaction Tuesday by Gordillo, leader of the 1 million-member Mexican teachers union, the largest, most disciplined voter and activist group in the PRI. In a radio interview Tuesday, Madrazo said Gordillo would be free to assume her post and the delay was in deference to her health problems.
But Gordillo has anticipated this rift for months. On Thursday, her backers are expected to register a new political party, the New Alliance Party, which she ostensibly would lead if she left or was ousted from the PRI.
Rafael Fernández de Castro, an analyst and professor at the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico, said he doubted a rupture would occur because it would break the PRI tradition of resolving internal differences; the loss of the teachers' vote to another candidate or party would be devastating to the PRI's chances next year.
But Alfonso Zárate, of the GCI political consultancy in Mexico City, said the distrust and enmity between the two leaders might make the split inevitable. "Madrazo has tried to destroy Elba Esther politically, and she has not forgotten," Zárate said.
The crisis came even as a group of PRI governors and a senator opposed to Madrazo's candidacy prepared to meet in Hermosillo, Sonora state, Friday. They hope to select from among themselves a candidate to oppose Madrazo in the primary, which the PRI decided Tuesday will be in November and will be open to all Mexican voters of all parties.
Tuesday's vote by the party's national leadership, while threatening to bring to a boil deep disputes that have roiled the PRI for two years, also may harm public trust in Madrazo, who scores low in public opinion polls.
Madrazo's "adversaries and even some potential allies say he doesn't keep his promises," columnist Jorge Fernández Menéndez wrote Monday in Milenio newspaper. "And nothing for someone who is seeking the presidency is more costly."
Madrazo revived the moribund PRI after its 2000 loss to President Vicente Fox and the National Action Party (PAN); under Madrazo's leadership, the PRI has kept its dominance of state governorships and has seen gains in Congress' lower house.
He could not have become PRI chief without Gordillo. She and her union joined with Madrazo's followers in 2002 to help him win the party leadership in a close contest with former Tlaxcala governor Beatriz Paredes. Madrazo, in turn, named Gordillo general secretary.
The two had a bitter falling out in 2003 over the PRI legislative agenda. Gordillo had sought to compromise with Fox on his reform legislation. She said Madrazo first supported her, then undercut her when PRI traditionalists objected to working with Fox.
"Madrazo accused Elba Esther of being at the service of Fox, which is absurd," Zárate said. "Madrazo's logic was the PRI should not do Fox's work for him, because it wouldn't help him in 2006."
In any case, Gordillo was fired as leader of the PRI congressional delegation, claiming afterward that Madrazo had betrayed her.
Since early 2004, Gordillo rarely has been seen in Mexico, reportedly staying in San Diego to undergo medical treatment for an undisclosed illness. But she has made it plain that she expects to clamber from general secretary to PRI leader, as party rules proscribe, if the party president quits. |
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