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 Editorials | Issues | December 2007 
The Man Who Insists He's the President of Mexico
 Chris Hawley - Arizone Republic
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| Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador greets supporters after a rally in Nopaltepec, Mexico. More than one year after losing the presidential election, Lopez Obrador continues to hold rallies and refuses to fade away. (Sergio Solache/The Arizona Republic)
Election aftermath
Mexico's 2006 presidential election was the closest in the country's history. Here's what happened to the three leading candidates:
FELIPE CALDERÓN
Won by a mere 0.58 percentage points. Now enjoys a 59 percent approval rating after one year in office. His National Action Party (PAN) is the largest party in Congress.
ANDRÉS MANUEL LÓPEZ OBRADOR
Refuses to acknowledge his defeat. Has proclaimed himself "Legitimate President of Mexico" and is running a symbolic, parallel government. His Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) ranks second in seats in the Chamber of Deputies and third in the Senate, but is divided over whether to recognize Calderón as president.
ROBERTO MADRAZO
Teaches political science. An avid runner, he was stripped of an age-group title in the 2007 Berlin Marathon after taking a shortcut. His once-almighty Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) lost many Congressional seats in the election. |
The vote was close. Fraud was alleged. Still, López Obrador lost last year's election. To his followers, that doesn't matter.
Nopaltepec, Mexico - He calls himself the "legitimate president of Mexico," convenes "Cabinet" meetings and tours the country non-stop, dispensing ID cards to anyone who will recognize his government-in-exile.
Andrés Manuel López Obrador is not really president of anything, not after losing a 2006 presidential election that was marred by allegations of fraud. But to the throngs of poor Mexicans who crowd around his podium in towns nationwide, the leftist ex-candidate is still commander in chief.
"We have made the decision to keep going, to keep fighting, to never surrender, to never back down," López Obrador said as about 400 supporters cheered him in the town of Nopaltepec, near Mexico City.
López Obrador's election loss may have marked a turning of the tide for Latin America's leftists, some analysts say, as more moderate liberals take the helm in many countries and the radical presidents of Bolivia and Venezuela face a strengthened opposition.
López Obrador himself is battling moderate members of his Democratic Revolutionary Party, or PRD, who are eager to make peace with the conservative and popular President Felipe Calderón.
But López Obrador refuses to recognize Calderón as president and refuses to fade away. He speaks at as many as 25 rallies every week, raging against the North American Free Trade Agreement, warning that Calderón wants to "hand our oil over to foreigners" and likening his struggle to that of Benito Juarez, Mexico's president-in-exile during the French occupation of the 1860s.
He has vowed to visit every one of Mexico's 2,454 municipalities by 2009, laying the groundwork for what many observers believe is another run for the presidency in 2012.
"He has enormous self-discipline. Week after week, he's out there," said George W. Grayson, author of a López Obrador biography. "He's convinced that for the mass of Mexicans, he's their redeemer, he's their savior."
Close election
Fireworks exploded over the central Mexican town of Axapusco as López Obrador rolled into the plaza in a beige SUV recently. "It's an honor to be with Obrador!" chanted a crowd of about 300 people, many of them carrying yellow balloons with the PRD sunburst logo.
After a brief introduction by a party official, López Obrador launched into the speech he has given, in varying forms, in the more than 1,000 towns he has visited since the election.
"After this fraud we have suffered, we cannot just throw away this movement we have built," he said. "We need to pull our people out of poverty and marginalization."
López Obrador, 54-year-old former mayor of Mexico City, lost to Calderón in the July 2, 2006, election by a mere 243,934 votes, or 0.58 percent of the nearly 41.8 million ballots cast. López Obrador's supporters alleged fraud, marching through Mexico City and camping out in the city's main Reforma Avenue.
Mexico's Electoral Court eventually upheld Calderón's victory.
Undaunted, López Obrador swore himself in as president on Nov. 20, 2006, in front of more than 100,000 supporters in Mexico City's main Zócalo plaza. Calderón was inaugurated 11 days later, and his popularity has risen steadily since then, thanks to a stable economy and a military crackdown on drug violence.
A poll by the Mitofsky consulting company indicated that, in November, 58.9 percent of Mexicans approved of the job Calderón was doing.
Meanwhile, López Obrador's PRD has become divided, said Oscar Camacho, author of a book about the election. A PRD faction dubbed the "New Left" has been striking legislative deals with Calderón's National Action Party, or PAN, over López Obrador's objections.
"Calderón is the president, and whoever doesn't recognize that is wrong in the head," Leonel Godoy, PRD gubernatorial candidate in the politically important state of Michoacán, told reporters in October.
The campaign trail
In a tent in the corner of Axapusco's main plaza, López Obrador's loyalists were being swiftly counted, registered and credentialed.
"Become an official representative of the Legitimate Government of Mexico," said a banner hanging from the tent. Inside, volunteers took digital photographs and fingerprints, then printed out ID cards. For $9, supporters could buy a copy of López Obrador's book, The Mafia Stole the Presidency From Us.
López Obrador claims he has signed up 1.8 million "official representatives" and hopes to have 5 million by the end of next year.
"I'm going to support him in whatever he does," Margarita Alvarez, a 35-year-old housewife, said as she put her fingerprint on a statement pledging allegiance to López Obrador's Legitimate Government.
López Obrador says he is not interested in breaking away from the PRD. However, many analysts say they're convinced the tours are aimed at mounting another presidential campaign.
"Let's just say, I don't think he's doing this just to meet periodically with 20 peasants in Macuspana," Grayson said.
More radical
López Obrador rejects comparisons to other Latin American leftists like Venezuela's Hugo Chavez or Bolivia's Evo Morales. But since the election, his speeches have taken on more radical tones, becoming more nationalistic and anti-free trade, with more emphasis on petroleum and foreign intervention.
At an assembly of 50,000 followers in Mexico City in November, he urged his followers to mount a campaign of civil disobedience if Calderón tries to give foreign companies a greater role in the state-controlled oil monopoly, Petróleos Mexicanos.
"We can turn Mexico into an energy power," he told a crowd on Friday. "Why don't we build more refineries? Because our (politicians) are rag dolls, puppets of foreign interests."
Still, López Obrador's election defeat last year, along with the rise of moderate liberal governments in countries like Chile, Brazil and Guatemala, may be a sign that Latin Americans are becoming more pragmatic about their leaders, Camacho said.
"I think people are saying to the left, 'Give me answers,' " he said. "The middle class didn't find answers in López Obrador."
In the town of San Martin de las Pirámides, Roberto Sánchez, owner of an Internet cafe, watched as López Obrador arrived for his fifth of seven rallies on Friday.
"That señor needs to admit he lost," Sánchez said. Across the plaza, however, 1,000 followers listened to López Obrador, enthralled.
"He's the only politician who really seems to care about the poor," said Verónica García, 34.The fireworks boomed again as López Obrador waded into the crowd, signing autographs and posing for pictures. Then the doors of the SUV closed, and it was off to the next town.
Reach the reporter at chris.hawley(at)arizonarepublic.com |
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