First presidential debate in Mexico, shaken by the crisis with Ecuador and political violence

First modification: 04/07/2024 – 14:55Last modification: 04/07/2024 – 14:54

3 min

The spotlight will be on the official candidate Claudia Sheinbaum, with a greater advantage of 20 points, and Xóchitl Gálvez, a center-right opponent who, it is anticipated, will take risks seeking to bring the scores a little closer.

In third place is Jorge Álvarez Máynez, a former deputy who was named standard bearer of the Citizen Movement (center left) at the last minute and will seek to make himself known.

“The debates are the only opportunity for Gálvez to try to make Sheinbaum make a mistake, make a face, a misplaced word,” Roy Campos, from the pollster Consulta Mitofsky, told AFP.

There are three meetings agreed before the general elections on June 2 and they will be divided into themes. In the first, the dominant themes will be the fight against corruption and the situation of health and education.

Gálvez's personality, and his colloquial speech, could work in his favor, concedes Campos, who however highlights the good “training” that Sheinbaum, with a scientific background, seems to have and that has contributed to softening his sober style.

The thorny issue of insecurity will be addressed in the third meeting, which the expert considers the most attractive because it will allow the candidates to interact, while in the first two they will answer questions from moderators.

Along with the violence linked to crime and the more than 450,000 murders recorded by the government since December 2006, attacks against politicians are multiplying in Mexico, with 23 candidates murdered in this electoral process, according to the consulting firm Integralia.

The ruling Morena party is the one that has suffered the most from the loss of candidates, including Gisela Gaytán, who was running for mayor of Celaya (center), but was shot to death on Monday when she was finishing her first rally and was surrounded by supporters.

Break with Ecuador

The unprecedented police intervention in the Mexican embassy in Quito to arrest former Ecuadorian vice president Jorge Glas has led to the opposition closing ranks with the government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

The leftist president declared the breaking of relations in the face of what he described as a “flagrant violation of international law.”

Gálvez was the first to join the sentence. “The diplomatic headquarters of any foreign nation are inviolable,” she wrote in X.

He was followed by Álvarez Máynez, who denounced an “attack against Mexican sovereignty”, while Sheinbaum referred to an “affront to diplomacy and international law.”

The escalation with Ecuador was framed in comments by the Mexican president, who on Wednesday drew parallels between the violence that marked the 2023 Ecuadorian presidential campaign, with the murder of candidate Fernando Villavicencio, and the violence in the campaign in Mexico.

López Obrador suggested that the Villavicencio crime created a “rarefied atmosphere of violence” that, added to the “manipulation” by some media, caused the fall in the polls of the leftist candidate Luisa González and the rise of Daniel Noboa, who was the winner.

This led Quito to declare, on Thursday, persona non grata to the Mexican ambassador; and on Friday, Mexico agreed to give asylum to Glas, who has taken refuge in the Mexican headquarters since December and who alleges political motives after the corruption accusations against him.

Foreign policy was also left for the third debate, unless the candidates use their time to refer to this diplomatic crisis.

In any case, analyst Campos considers it difficult for these exchanges to reverse Sheinbaum's advantage. “It's very difficult for a citizen to say 'oh, so I'm going to change my vote,'” he said.

According to a survey conducted by the Oraculus firm, Sheinbaum has 59% of the voting intention, Gálvez with 35% and Álvarez Máynez with 6%.