Dave Graham: Mexican politics turns ugly, with allegations of links to drug gangs

SLOWLY but surely, drug cartels have ground down support for Mexico’s ruling conservatives, with a trail of dead over the past five years.

Now, president Felipe Calderon’s National Action Party (PAN) is trying to use the same gangs as a quick fix for its fading hopes of re-election next year – by painting rivals for the presidency as corrupt and in the pockets of the cartels.

Calderon’s term in office has been dominated by a bloody conflict with drug traffickers that has claimed 45,000 lives, eroding support for the PAN and turning the drugs war into a make-or-break issue for July’s presidential elections.

Latest surveys show his party is headed for defeat. The PAN is trying hard to taint the image of its bitter rival, the centrist Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). Last month, Calderon said some PRI members might consider deals with drug gangs, stirring up claims by critics of the opposition party that it made secret pacts to keep the peace in the 71 years it ruled Mexico until 2000. Last week, the office of Calderon’s attorney-general said it was investigating whether a drug cartel pressured voters to back the PRI in a state election on 13 November.

John Bailey, a political scientist at Georgetown University in Washington, says Calderon has played a “double game” by calling for unity in the fight against organised crime – then suggesting his rivals were complicit with the gangs. “Going negative is ugly, but it’s effective,” he said. “I don’t think Calderon has clean hands on this at all.”

But Calderon is well aware most Mexicans want to root out drug gangs – and reject making deals with them.

So far, the mud-slinging has not hurt the PRI’s main presidential hopeful, the telegenic Enrique Pena Nieto, 45. Polls give him about twice the support of his nearest rivals.

The closeness of the election in Michoacan two weeks ago made it ideal for raising the spectre of foul play. The western state has been ravaged by drug gangs and the PRI candidate for governor defeated Calderon’s older sister by just 43,000 votes – out of about three million eligible voters.

Then a tape was leaked to the Mexican media in which a man identified as a leader of local cartel La Familia said voters in his district had to back the PRI or face reprisals.

The PRI leadership has denied cutting deals with drug gangs, but its record of corruption during the party’s long and often authoritarian hold on power has made it an easy target. The end of PRI rule in 2000 is seen by many as the start of democracy in Mexico, faith in which has been tested during the drug war. A poll in October showed only 40 per cent of Mexicans felt democracy was the best political system.

A survey this month showed just 14 per cent of Mexicans think Calderon, who is barred by law from serving a second term, can win the conflict. Despite this, two-thirds of voters in another poll wanted the next president to continue the war.