Reforma / Staff
Mexico City, May 28, 2021: At least 34 candidates or aspirants to elected office (via the June 6 elections) have been assassinated. However, according to President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the violence during the campaign season has been magnified by the media.
When answering a question about the attacks on candidates yesterday, at his morning press conference, López Obrador said:
"It's yellow journalism. It aims to make the atmosphere tense. They used to call it sensationalism; now it's yellow journalism. Police reports have acquired a primary role in the media.
"There is now an obvious political polarization because all the conservatives have grouped against our project and the media have taken sides, so all of this is magnified. It's normal; it has has to do with the (campaign) season," said the President.
MV Note: The three major, traditional, ususally rival parties of the PRI (Party of the Institutional Revolution), PAN (National Action Party) and PRD (Party of the Democratic Revolution), have formed a united front for the election in an effort to overcome the majority control of the Chamber of Deputies in Congress now held by Morena (the Movement for National Regeneration), founded by López Obrador in 2014. Senators are not up for election, as they all have six-year terms that began in 2018.
On Wednesday night, Hugo Bobadilla Gutiérrez, a PT (Labor Party) candidate for a state legislature deputy seat in (the state of) Morelos, was attacked with bullets as he was on his way to his house after a rally in Yecapixtla.
Hours earlier, Jorge Alberto Alonso Gutiérrez, a candidate for Mayor of Acapulco for the Fuerza por México (Force for Mexico) party, was shot while he was traveling in a truck in the Costa Azul (Blue Coast) subdivision in the city.
And on Tuesday, Alma Rosa Barragán, a candidate for the Municipal Presidency of Moroleón, (in the state of Guanajuato) was shot to death at a political rally in that municipality. Also, Omar Plancarte, the PVEM (Green Party) candidate for Mayor of Uruapan (in the state of Michoacán), was kidnapped from his ranch. That same day, the candidates Xóchitl Flores, in Chimalhuacán (in the state of Mexico), and Fermín Ruano, in Ayutla de los Libres (in the state of Guerrero), were beaten.
According to the consulting firm Etellek, from September 2020 to April of this year, 476 criminal acts have been reported against politicians and candidates. Thirty-one were murders of candidates.
Just in May, in addition to Alma Rosa Barragán, Arturo Flores, a Citizens Movement candidate for city council of Landa de Matamoros, Querétaro, and Abel Murrieta Gutiérrez, a Citizens Movement candidate for Mayor of Cajeme (in the state of Sonora), were executed. Murrieta Gutiérrez was assassinated while on a campaign tour in Ciudad Obregón, Sonora.
With these three, there are a total of 34 candidates killed in the framework of the electoral contest.
When addressing the issue yesterday, López Obrador called for no one to be attacked.
"Let us all try to live in peace, so that no one is attacked and may there also be ethics in the media, less yellow journalism, even when there are (political) differences (...), so that we can resolve them with arguments, with debate, respecting each other."