Et tu, AMLO?

David Agren,  writing in the World Politics Review,  asks “What’s Next for Andrés Manuel López Obrador?” .  He comes not to praise AMLO, but to bury him:

… López Obrador unveiled a new theme for winning support during the upcoming third year of his running campaign of opposition: Rescuing the slumping “family economy,” and railing against the small band of business elites and the “political mafia” that he says control the country and which he blames for rigging the 2006 election.

The message went largely unheard, however. Fewer than 40,000 adherents marched through central Mexico City that day, a far cry from the estimated 300,000 that witnessed his coronation as the nation’s self-proclaimed “legitimate president” two years ago. And few from the PRD attended. Some marchers carried acerbic signs lampooning the new PRD leadership. Many others sported colors of the smaller Convergence and Labor parties, two left-wing parties that ran in a 2006 coalition with the PRD and have been unwavering in their support for López Obrador. Press coverage was scant.

López Obrador is seeking to remain relevant in 2009 by capitalizing on new crises, like the deteriorating economic situation that has sent the peso tumbling and prices soaring. But his constant protests and admonishments to eschew working with President Felipe Calderón are splitting the Mexican left and driving away potential supporters.

Agren is not one of AMLO’s supporters (and that’s ok), but I wouldn’t write the guy off so quickly, or dismiss him lightly. Besides, given the economic downturn that’s facing Mexico (and the rest of the planet), there’s that annoying fact that the guy was basically correct:

… according to Federico Estévez, political science professor at ITAM in Mexico City.

“He was betting that the Mexican economy would sink, and now it turns out that it may sink because of the world,” Estévez said. “It’s no longer an untenable strategic position.”

First, I’m not sure that a drop in attendance at rallies is any indication that the guy’s lost his relevance…. not when at least 10,000 voters have switched parties because of AMLO.

Secondly, with AMLO mostly cut off by the “mainstream media” — and what coverage he receives mostly limited to internet (which tends to reach a wealthier audience than the working class and poor who make up the bulk of his supporters) — and the daily pressures of making a living in this country, people are going to go on with their lives, and aren’t going to obsess over politics. At most, they’ll make a cynical joke and get on with supporting their family.

Third… I’m not so sure the political split in the leftist coalition is a bad thing. As I mentioned to David yesterday, the PRI has been moving back to it’s leftist roots under Beatriz Parades Rangel. With the PRD in a less confrontational position without AMLO, this may let the PRI and PRD work together on at least broad economic policy. And, while the PRD has always been the smallest of the major parties (and a fractious circular firing squad at that), it has dominated the Federal District much as the PRI once dominated the country. That is, it’s a very broad coalition, and only appears united at the highest level. On the street, there’s any number of squabbling factions.

For right now, this doesn’t seem probable, given new party chair Delores Padeirna’s decision that the PRD will NOT form coalitions.  Ana Maria Salazar suggested on her Imagen radio program that she thinks this makes PRD appear more democratic, but — on a national level — it also means the party would be too small to effectively control legislation without a coalition partner.  Right now the betting is that the small Social Democratic Party will eventually join PRD (they had been in talks about a possible merger before Padeirna’s announcement), but — depending on how well the PRD does in the 2009 congressional elections, I wouldn’t rule out a PRD-PRI center-left front in 2012.

For now, the PRD OWNS the Federal District. The other parties — even PAN, which has a smaller ideological spread to cover, and is very well organized and disciplined, cannot compete except in a few delegaciones.   PRI is hapless and hopeless. This probably hasn’t been good for the PRD — or the voters — who are going to vote for a leftist party, but could use a little more democratic choice. By making Convergencia the “alternative leftist” party, at least in the Federal District, the parties will be forced to pay more attention to the candidates for local office, and — one hopes — give voters a genuine alternative and more attractive (politically and socially) choices. Or at least the option of selecting the lesser of two evils.

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