Claudia Sheinbaum, Mexico’s first female president, has promised to continue her predecessor’s course of anti-neoliberal economic development.
Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo, now president-elect of Mexico, in 2020 while mayor of Mexico City. (Secretaría de Cultura Ciudad de México, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0)
By Zoe Alexandra
Peoples Dispatch
The scientist, [and former mayor of Mexico City], Nobel Peace Prize winner, longtime activist and now the country’s first female president, defeated another female, Xóchitl Gálvez Ruíz, who was the candidate of the right-wing Force and Heart for Mexico Coalition of PRI-PAN-PRD. Jorge Álvarez Máynez came in third with around 10 percent of the total vote share.
Sheinbaum addressed thousands of supporters in the Zocalo in the center of Mexico City to celebrate her victory.
“I feel excited and thankful, for the recognition that you have given to the Fourth Transformation of public life of Mexico. Here as we have always done, I promise to not let you down. Today, the people of Mexico have made possible the continuity and advance of the Fourth Transformation, and also for the first time in 200 years, we women have arrived at the presidency of the republic!”
Earlier in a press conference, Sheinbaum also announced that MORENA [the ruling party since 2018] had achieved a majority in the Chamber of Deputies and was set to also win a majority in the Senate.
Vows to Continue Making History
Celebration of Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s July 1, 2018, election victory, Zocalo, Mexico City. (Salvador alc, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons)
Sheinbaum has vowed to continue the project of the “Fourth Transformation” inaugurated by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, aka AMLO, led by the principle of “Mexican Humanism.”
The anti-neoliberal socio economic project has raised the standard of living for the majorities in the country through the increase in minimum wage, expanded social and economic programs to increase access to key rights of education, housing, healthcare and more.
AMLO will finish his term in office with an 80 percent approval rating, according to Gallup polls.
Sheinbaum, [who takes office on Oct. 1] spoke about the importance of the Fourth Transformation project in an interview with Peoples Dispatch and BreakThrough News in April 2023. At the time she said:
“… states have to give the rights to the people. What do we think is a right? Education, health, a home, pension for all the elders. We also believe in strategic areas of the economy such as energy. The state has to be part of this, especially electricity, oil and mainly and now lithium … . It’s important and it’s going to be very important in the future … . You cannot have private investment measured only by GDP or international investment. You have to measure investment, public and private, in wealth for the people. And that’s the big difference with neoliberalism that believed that everything was going to be solved by the market.”
Mexico’s northern neighbor, the United States, is its most important trading partner. During AMLO’s six-year term, he managed to maintain a mostly amicable relationship with both former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden.
Mexico’s AMLO with Biden in Mexico City in January 2023. (White House/Adam Schultz)
But nor did he shy away from holding his ground on key issues.
For example, as president, AMLO was one of the strongest voices on topics which directly contradict U.S. policy such as Washington’s blockade of Cuba, the imprisonment and persecution of WikiLeaks Publisher Julian Assange, and the subordination of the region to corporate and imperialist interests.
Mexican Pres Andrés Manuel López Obrador, in his speech on Friday honoring Mexican Independence Day, called for release of Julian Assange. Assange’s brother & father were invited guests to the ceremony along w/the families of Cesar Chavez, Nelson Mandela & Martin Luther King Jr. pic.twitter.com/58KQudNu1k
— Daniel Medina (@dmedin11) September 18, 2022
AMLO was also a driving figure in reinvigorating spaces of regional integration and served as pro-tempore president of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC). How Sheinbaum relates to her northern neighbor and the rest of the region will be a defining feature of her presidency.
Zoe Alexandrais a correspondent for Peoples Dispatch.
This article is from Peoples Dispatch.
Views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
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Publish date : 2024-06-03 12:49:19
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