It was a hot afternoon in Ciudad Obregón, a town in northwestern Mexico. Abel Murrieta, representing the mayor of Cajeme township, where the town is located, stood at a crossroads in the shopping center, carrying ballot papers to vote on June 6.
A man in a white shirt and jeans came in, grabbed a shotgun and fired 10 rounds at the former state attorney general, plus two on his head, before crossing the street and fleeing in a waiting car while Murrieta lay on the road. Images taken by security TV cameras that show spreadsheets as well blood carrying his white robe.
Murrieta was named the 32nd candidate to be assassinated at the end of election day, with Mexicans across the country voting for 500 lawmakers, 15 government governors and thousands of mayors and state officials.
Since the election began last September, 85 politicians have been killed, including 32 former incumbents, according to Etellekt Consultores, who they follow violence. This makes it the second most bloody election after voting for President in 2018.
According to Etellekt, most of those affected are those who have been elected mayors of the opposition party and those in those constituencies. Their deaths have revealed links between criminal gangs and government officials who protect them.
“When you meet them, you are tortured or killed,” said Rubén Salazar, director of Etellekt. “This is the Mexican democracy in the region… No one can stand for office without the consent of the mayor and the criminal director.”
Murrieta does not seem to have given up. Mu after his death, declared him “a violent man… I am not afraid”. A few hours after his assassination, the former robber was captured by a state road safety camera represented by the former security minister in López Obrador representing the governor.
The killings have exacerbated the problems faced by President Andrés Manuel López Obradorhugging not bullets“The plan to fight crime, its new military police and its repeated promises to bring peace to a country where violence has been rampant for 15 years and about 100 kill day.
Violence, which has been on the rise Mexico since former President Felipe Calderón launched a brutal drug war in 2006, it is a major concern for Mexico, ruling many nations. An investigation by the El Financiero newspaper this month found two-thirds of the population disagreed and how López Obrador handled the situation, with only 18% agreeing.
Since 2006, the figure has more than tripled. The government says it has soared, with a 4% homicide report in the first four months of this year compared to the same period last year.
But in April, there were 2,857 murders, 4% more than in April 2020, and the murder of 77 women – the murder of women due to gender – jumped by 13% the same month last year.
The Mexican genocide lasted a long time in 2019, killing 34,682 people and 970 people feminism. Last year was a nightmare: 34,554 murders and 977 murders. So far this year there have been 11,277 homicides and 318 women murders.
Ricardo Márquez Blas, a former security guard, said several times since López Obrador’s time began, the number of murders exceeded 3,000 a month, including the killing of women, compared to only three in the 2012-18 government.
Lopez Obrador, who took office in 2018, says he has taken a different approach to addressing the root causes of crime, giving young people jobs and education instead of dealing directly with cartels.
Mexico City protesters protest violence against women and girls © Claudio Cruz / AFP via Getty Images
But critics say he, like previous governments, relies on the military instead of reforming state and local police in the country. officers find about $ 600 a month, and half have to buy their shoes.
Opposing in detail the Mexican approach, former US ambassador Christopher Landau He said López Obrador had a “fancy idea” for drug dealers even though he claims to oversee “anywhere from 35 to 40% of the country”.
“They see vendors. . . like his Vietnam, which has been the case for some of his predecessors, so I think. . . they see this as a distraction not to focus on what they want to do, ”he told an online seminar.
This commemorates the “pax narca” – the tolerance of cartel material as long as it lasts – which dominated the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in Mexico since the 20th century.
“The president doesn’t want to take El Narco,” said Salazar, using a Mexican voice to send drug dealers.
He also said that López Obrador, who is known to want to take over the central power of PRI, “does not understand” that coexistence has already been disrupted when new parties disrupt good terrorist alliances and create new ones.
“The president does not want to realize that there is a big political crisis in this country going on,” Salazar said, as politics and crime are intertwined.
The analysts say the split period is also affected by regular press conferences, where they continue to criticize political and electoral candidates who claim to be elected.
“With all these divisions, instead of fulfilling its promises of peace, it is giving us a world of frustration,” said Gema Kloppe-Santamaría, a psychiatrist and activist at Loyola University in Chicago.
“López Obrador has disrupted the election to the point that he has declared war on the electoral bodies. My biggest concern is that what we are seeing now will not end after June 6,” he said.
