AMLO once again called the INE “undemocratic” for the handling of the Mandate Revocation

This morning, at the morning conference on March 14, the President of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), accused the National Electoral Institute (INE) of acting in an “undemocratic” manner in the face of the revocation of mandate consultation and blamed him for violating the constitutional mandate. According to the president, the institution “does not want anyone to know so that no one participates”.

He considered that the INE is not only doing insufficient work to inform the Mexican population of the opportunity to actively participate in the consultation, but also explicitly indicated the institute's intentions not to disseminate the democratic exercise at all, in which on April 10, 2022, decide whether or not the president continues to hold office.

López Obrador described this fault as a “coup strategy” which, in his words, Mexico has already lived before in previous governments, among which he highlighted the six-year term of Enrique Peña Nieto. “When the president is weak they steal,” he commented in disapproving the INE, and urged transparency in the resources used by the body for the exercise of the consultation.

“The best thing would be for them to make the money transparent, what they use to manage social networks and what they pay to the beating mercenary journalists (...), but if they continue that way, we will exercise our right to reply”

On Thursday, March 10, the Chamber of Deputies approved the interpretation decree resolving the concept of government propaganda, to establish that the “expressions” of public servants are not considered as propaganda and thus not be prohibited during the electoral ban of any exercise of participation citizen, including the revocation of mandate consultation.

This caused great controversy among members of Congress who defended its legitimacy and those who considered it unconstitutional. Despite this, the proposal was welcomed by the chairman of the board of directors who sent it to the Senate of the Republic.

Thus, government propaganda is considered to be “the set of writings, publications, images, recordings and projections disseminated, under any form of social communication charged to the public budget, labeled specifically for that purpose, by a public entity” and that seeks to express its work, actions and achievements.

Since September 2021, when the Federal Law on the Revocation of Mandate was approved by the Chamber of Deputies, López Obrador, generated debate in political and public opinion by being accused of constantly engaging in political propaganda, especially in morning conferences and presidential tours to various states of the Republic.

Just last month, through its Complaints and Complaints Commission, the INE had already issued two precautionary measures against the president of Mexico and his party, Morena, with the aim of withdrawing government propaganda during the electoral ban, after the National Action Party (PAN) pointed to the publication of networks social and web pages that favored those who are in the presidency.

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