Turkey’s TRT World runs a report Aug. 15 recalling the Chontal Maya blockades of the Pemex oil installations in Mexico’s southern state of Tabasco in 1996, to protest the pollution of their lands and waters. This is a struggle that is still being waged today by the Chontal of Tabasco, but back in 1996 the figurehead of the movement was Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known as AMLO)—now Mexico’s left-populist president-elect. The report asks if AMLO as president will remain true to the indigenous struggle that first put him on Mexico’s political map. In a segment exploring this question, TRT World speaks with Melissa Ortiz Massó of the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre and CounterVortex editor Bill Weinberg.
Zapatistas accuse AMLO
Subcommander Galeano of Mexico's rebel Zapatistas isssued a communique declaring that AMLO was the "furthest to the right" of the four candidates in the election, citing his support for a development corridor acorss the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, the "Tren Maya" tourism scheme, and other mega-development projects that threaten indigenous lands. The statement charges that business magnate Aflonso Romo, named as AMLO's cabinet chief, has investments in timber operations and fruit plantations that will be part of the trans-Isthmus project. (La Jornada, SDP Noticias, Aug. 15)
AMLO is speaking of a "Fourth Transformation" of Mexico, after Independence, the Reform era of Benito Juárez and the Revolution. (CCNews) But Galeano says this really means the "Fourth Transformation" of the PRI, noting AMLO's roots in what had been Mexico's dictatorial ruling party for 70 years.
A profile in La Jornada tells us that Alfonso Romo has had business dealings with Augusto Pinochet, and is an admirer of Reagan, Thatcher and Porfirio Díaz—Mexico's brutal "Liberal" dictator who ruled for 30 years until the Revolution of 1910. Yet he is also said to be the grand-nephew of Francisco Madero, who led the 1910 Revolution.
Uh… really?