by the El Reporero’s staff
Felipe Calderón
On Sept. 29, 35 bodies were found dumped in two trucks on the main road from the port city of Veracruz to Boca del Río (also in the state of Veracruz). The state and federal authorities are losing control of Veracruz. This could have major political implications, because the state is the third biggest electoral district in the country after the Estado de México and the Distrito Federal. If drug gangs intimidate voters, they could determine the result of next year’s general elections.
In Veracruz’s 2010 gubernatorial election, 3.1m people voted, of a total electorate of 5.3m. In the 2006 presidential election, Felipe Calderón Hinojosa won the presidency by the narrowest margin ever: 243,934 votes.
Guatemala heads into the unknown
Right-wing former general Otto Pérez Molina of the Partido Patriota (PP) will face populist businessman Manuel Baldizón of Libertad Democrática Renovada (Líder) in the Nov. 6 run-off for the presidency. While this is in line with poll predictions, the big surprise on Sept. 11 was the relatively poor performance by Pérez Molina, who had consistently led the polls by a country mile.
This, together with the surge of Baldizón, who has most benefited from the exclusion of former First Lady Sandra Torres of the Unidad Nacional de la Esperanza (UNE)-Gran Alianza Nacional (Gana), and the strong performance in the congressional and municipal vote by the UNE-Gana, which has rejected outright a future alliance with the PP, suggest that the second round is a far from foregone conclusion.
Is Humala setting himself up for a Bolivian dilemma?
President Ollanta Humala has had a good run of it in his first six weeks in office, scoring two important triumphs. First, he secured the unanimous approval of the new congress, in which his ruling Gana Perú doesn’t have a reliable working majority, for a new ‘Law of Consultation’ (Ley de Consulta), which will give local (mostly indigenous) communities more say over mining and other investments in their areas.
Secondly, he secured the agreement of mining companies for a new regulatory framework for the sector, including a new royalty tax scheme applicable to operating profits known as the ‘Gravamen’ or ‘Obolo Minero’.
Politicians and commentators from all sides applauded. Yet the two reforms risk creating the very tensions they were supposed to avoid.
The Law of Consultation enshrines the right of indigenous groups to have a say in how their land is developed; the mining deal binds the government and mining companies together in a memorandum of understanding (MOU) which effectively says that the government will respect investment rights in exchange for higher taxation – revenues the government is ultimately dependent upon to implement its plans for social development and economic inclusion. (Latin News contributed to this report).
