The appearance of dozens of billboards in the country that promote the image of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador in the face of the next mandate revocation consultation, and the complaints of Morena militants for not being able to promote that exercise, reached the General Council of the National Electoral Institute.
During today’s session in the General Council of the INE, a modification to the General Guidelines for the control of the revocation process of the mandate of the President of the Republic was approved, as well as the deadlines for the control of the Reports of income and expenses that are present.
This modification was based on the determination of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) which declared the invalidity of some articles of the Federal Law of Revocation of Mandate that allowed the parties to participate in the promotion of this exercise.
Within the framework of the discussion of this issue, the PRD representative before the INE, José Ángel Ávila, asked the INE to investigate the financing received by the organization “Que Continua la Democracia,” which, he said, was registered on October 11 of 2021 in Coahuila, just a few days before the start of the collection of signatures in support of the revocation of the mandate and is headed by the former Morena candidate, Gabriela Jiménez.
He indicated that said organization is behind the appearance of dozens of billboards throughout the country that promote the image of the President of the Republic with the legend “Keep on AMLO”.
He argued that this organization uses the word AMLO, which is a trademark registered in 2000 by today’s President López Obrador before the Mexican Institute of Intellectual Property.
He asked the General Council of the INE to ask the Financial Intelligence Unit information on the amounts and origin of the resources received by that organization, although it was rejected by the majority of the electoral advisers.
In the same vein, Marisol Vargas Bárcenas, representative of the PAN, questioned what the INE is going to do with associations and people who are dedicated to promoting the image of the President of the Republic through billboards, in support houses and by pasting stickers. She asked the INE not to be a “permissive, complacent or omitted” authority.
For his part, the representative of the PRI, José Calzada Rovirosa, said that his party has already filed complaints on this issue, and asked the INE to take action on the matter to investigate, lower the billboards and sanction said organization in case of finding financing. illicit.
Calzada Rovirosa maintained that the impact of the promotion of the image of the head of the federal Executive not only affects the preferences of the next revocation of the mandate, but also in the electoral processes underway in six states of the country.
It will be investigated, responds the INE
Counselor Ciro Murayama stressed that there are already complaints filed in the INE Complaints Commissionboth due to the appearance of billboards and the irregular intervention by political actors, for which he guaranteed that they will be reviewed in light of the Federal Mandate Revocation Law.
“If in any situation there were public resources behind some association, some campaign referring to the revocation of the mandate, we would be facing a crime, before the diversion of public resources, I hope we do not get to that,” he said.
He argued that the consultation exercise to revoke the mandate should not be a campaign of opacity by non-legitimized entities, and referred that “it is clear that there is a political purpose.”
The counselor mentioned that the Complaints and Denunciations Commission has already warned of behaviors that are not being loyal to the law in the revocation process, and for this reason said commission has issued precautionary measures so that public actors respect the legal framework on the prohibition of government propaganda (veda) and undue promotion of the consultation.
Counselor José Roberto Ruiz Saldaña said that, in effect, there is propaganda that should not exist and could be of considerable dimensions.
INE calls to respect ban and prohibition of undue promotion
The president of the INE, Lorenzo Córdova, said that the mandate revocation process is progressing well, since almost 50 days after the mandate revocation consultation, it already has 267,804 of the 280,000 poll workers required.
He indicated that 2.2 million citizens have been visited in their homes in just 11 days, so the training already has an advance of 93.6 percent.
For this reason, after Morena militants such as its leader, Mario Delgado, argue for censorship by the INE to promote the revocation consultation, counselor Lorenzo Córdova clarified that this electoral body does not censor or limit by its own decision, but rather within the framework of the law, the improper action of officials or public entities, for which he called for respect for the laws approved by legislators of all parties in Congress.
“It draws attention, and here a new call, the lack of democratic commitment and adherence to the rules that the same political actors gave themselves, that we have seen in recent days. The prohibition of government propaganda was not decided by the INE. Moreover, it is very likely that the principle of neutrality that political actors cannot speak during a mandate revocation process, the oppositions calling for the revocation to take place and the party in government and the ruler himself defending himself against that circumstance , was prohibited by the constitutional legislators in the respective rules. That is why we speak of the INE sensor, false! The ones who put that rule were the legislators, ”he maintained.
Lorenzo Córdova called for all actors, from the President of the Republic to municipal officials, to respect the rules that were not set by the INE, but by legislators, and which the INE must enforce. “And these behaviors are not up to the citizenship they claim to respect,” he said.
Morena’s representative, Mario Rafael Llergo Latournerie, insisted that the INE limits the freedom of expression of its soldiers, which, he considered, “is not government propaganda.”
The president of the INE, Lorenzo Córdova, also clarified that this institute does not finance international organizations, as Morena militants have assured. He stressed that the INE only pays for services rendered to the Inter-American Union of Electoral Organizations (UNIORE) for electoral observation.