MSG143G/01E MEXICO: Zedillo Must Achieve Peace and Modernisation

MEXICO, Nov 11 (IPS) - When Mexican President-elect Ernesto Zedillo said last Wednesday that he knows how to govern "near the people and with the people," he was underlying the difficult task ahead.

Neither the economic moves toward privatisation and the opening of markets nor the governing party's victory in the Aug. 21 elections have guaranteed peace, which continues to be threatened by poverty and inequality.

The future government will inherit a stable economy, with steady investment, single-digit inflation and a secure exchange rate, along with a moderate but constant increase in production of just under three percent.

The country is also in the process of economic integration with Canada and the United States under the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and is open to forming new alliances, possibly with the countries of the Pacific Basin.

However, social inequality and injustices led to an armed uprising by the indigenous people in the southern state of Chiapas on Jan. 1, the very day NAFTA went into effect.

The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) has held uninterrupted power in Mexico for 65 years, but as the new president, Zedillo will be sailing stormy waters if he aims to continue the same policies.

His tasks will be to manage the promised entry into the first world, opposition criticisms of "a lack of democracy" and the continued threat from the Zapatista guerrillas.

While the PRI victory is not being questioned, as there is tacit agreement that "there was government fraud, but they would have won anyway," there is strong criticism of electoral irregularities.

The two major opposition parties, the right-wing National Action Party (PAN), and the Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD), either abstained or voted against a Parliamentary motion on Wednesday to confirm Zedillo as president-elect.

All 186 members of the minority opposition withdrew from the meeting in protest before the final result was announced, which passed with the 300 PRI votes in favour.

Accusations against the government included the falsification of electoral registers and voting credentials, abuse of the media, the misappropriation of public funds in favour of the PRI, vote buying, stuffed ballot boxes and fraudulent returns.

© Inter Press Service (2014) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service