Two women will compete for the first time for the presidency in 2024 in Mexico, where the ex-mayor of Mexico City Claudia Sheinbaum was nominated Wednesday as the candidate of the ruling party, Movement for National Regeneration (Morena, left).
Ms. Sheinbaum, 61, will have as her main opponent Senator Xochitl Galvez, 60, invested candidate Sunday after dominating the primaries of a Front grouping three opposition parties.
A woman therefore has a good chance of succeeding outgoing President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador in 2024 at the head of Mexico, Latin America’s second largest economy facing the United States.
This would be a first in the history of a country that records thousands of feminicides a year, in addition to the extreme violence of drug cartels in some places on its territory.
A scientist by training, close to the outgoing president, Ms. Sheinbaum came out on top in an opinion poll organized by her Morena party to decide between six contenders in total.
Driven by the popularity of the outgoing president, she is currently the favorite in the elections scheduled for early June.
“Today the people of Mexico have decided,” she said after the results were announced. “The electoral process begins tomorrow at the national level. There is not a minute to lose.”
The survey of a sample of 12,500 people undermined the Morena unit, the war machine set up by Lopez Obrador to bring the left to power in 2018.
Even before the announcement of the results, Ms. Sheinbaum’s main rival, former Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, called for the opinion poll to be repeated, denouncing “irregularities”.
Alone among the six contenders, Mr. Ebrard snubbed the announcement of the results, saying that one of his representatives had been beaten by the police.
The results are final, Morena warned.
These primaries were “a democratic, unitary exercise” considered the president of the National Council of the party, Alfonso Durazo, announcing the results.
“There are no incidents that have permanently affected the final result,” he added.
Mr. Ebrard could leave Morena according to persistent rumors relayed in the Mexican press.
The feminine duel between Mrs. Sheinbaum and Mrs. Galvez promises to be a head-on clash between two paths and two styles.
The granddaughter of Jewish grandparents who left Bulgaria and Lithuania, Ms. Sheinbaum is an apparently reserved physicist.
“I’m a girl from 1968,” says the former mayor of Mexico City, who claims the legacy of social struggles without ever having been a member of the PRI, the former dominant party for 70 years.
Coming from the left-wing intellectual bourgeoisie of the capital, she is committed to continuing the policy of outgoing President Lopez Obrador.
Ms. Sheinbaum wants to continue to defend the poorest, especially indigenous communities, while highlighting the good macroeconomic results of her mentor (strong currency, sound finances).
Frequently dressed in a huipil (traditional blouse), Galvez is from Tepatepec, a small town in the state of Hidalgo (center). Coming from a modest background, “Xochitl” (flower, in the Nahuatl language) was born to an indigenous Otomi father and a mestizo mother.
An engineer and business leader, naturally spontaneous, Galvez peppers her speeches with colloquial expressions.
“My golden rule: no laziness, no crooks, no motherfuckers,” she hammered home in an interview with AFP on Monday. She confirmed that she would fight “with her ovaries” against violence.
She challenged Mrs. Sheinbaum to free herself from the tutelage of the president: “Let her tell him (…) take care of governing and let me be the candidate”.
Politically, Ms. Galvez says she borrows ideas from the three parties that support her (the economic liberalism of the right-wing PAN, the ideals of social justice of the left-wing PRD, and the institutional heritage of the PRI).
“With me there will be no backtracking on acquired rights, both for the LGBTQ community and for women”, she promises, when asked about decriminalized abortion in September 2021. Marriage for all is legal in the 32 states.
Driven by the popularity of the outgoing president, Ms. Sheinbaum is the favorite in the presidential election, according to two recent polls.
Combative, “Xochitl” says she can catch up, after having woken up opposition in just two months of internal campaigning.
09/07/2023 04:39:52 – Mexico (AFP) – © 2023 AFP
