Monday, March 8, 2004

 

Political corruption in Mexico — the rest of the story

 

By Barnard R. Thompson

 

With a plethora of corruption scandals surfacing on a near daily basis in Mexico, one might suspect that purported democratic advancements and betterment of civil structures and proceedings are little more than changes to insure that everything stays the same.  On the other hand, what may hopefully be evolving is a more open and representative society, with transparency in governance and public servants who are actually governed by rules of law and held responsible for their actions.

 

Still, the scandal reports and juicy videotapes represent more than just isolated incidents — take for example the latest videotaped outrage in Mexico City.

 

On March 3 a video (supposedly filmed prior to the 2003 midterm elections) was aired on a popular morning news program in Mexico City.  The video showed René Bejarano Martínez hungrily stuffing bills into a briefcase, a plastic bag and his pockets, reportedly one of three installments that totaled nearly US$4 million.

 

Carlos Ahumada Kurtz gave the money to Bejarano.  Ahumada, an Argentina born naturalized Mexican citizen, has been especially active in Mexico City since 1997, when the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) first won the mayoralty of the Federal District.  Among other things, Ahumada owns a construction business that has been awarded numerous contracts (apparently by hook or by crook) by past PRD government officials.

 

Considering the 2006 presidential hopes of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the current PRD mayor of Mexico City — coupled with Ahumada’s reputation, the latter lost favor and thus lucrative highway construction and paving contracts with the current government.  According to vox populi, the money given to Bejarano was to once again insure Ahumada company contracts.

 

Bejarano now claims the money was a campaign contribution for another candidate, an assertion that the PRD candidate herself and party officials adamantly deny.  And apparently there has never been an accounting for the funds that have long since disappeared.

 

René Bejarano, up until March 3 when he resigned, was a top-level official of the PRD.  Prior to being elected to the Federal District Legislative Assembly (ALDF) in 2003, he served as the personal assistant to the mayor.  A leader of the potent Democratic Left Current within the PRD, Bejarano is a longtime personal friend, confidant and kitchen cabinet advisor to López Obrador.

 

Born in 1957, Bejarano studied education and later taught economic policy at Mexico City’s Metropolitan Autonomous University.  And while he was a member of one of Mexico’s influential teacher’s unions, and active with leftist splinter parties that were among those that ultimately merged to become the PRD, it was the devastating 1985 Mexico City earthquake that brought Bejarano power and control.

 

Bejarano was one of the founders of the New Tenochtitlán Popular Union (UPNT), a supposed altruistic group formed to help earthquake victims.  But according to citizen complaints, what Bejarano and his group were really up to was looting, theft and home takeovers.

 

But nothing happened to Bejarano, and subsequently his UPNT found more innovative ways to exploit the needy.

 

Bejarano and company obtained a PRD-linked concession in areas of Mexico City for the distribution of low price breakfasts to qualifying school children, an important government program in Mexico’s effort to help lower income families.  But according to a government audit in 1994, rather than selling the breakfasts at a minimal cost the UPNT had doubled the price.  Adding insult to injury, the UPNT/PRD never paid the government’s producer for the breakfasts they had received in the first place.

 

The scam also had a political angle, with the threat that the children’s food would be withheld unless parents agreed to attend PRD meetings and rallies.  Similar political tampering was exposed again in 1999, in what was one of the more disgusting of PRD affairs.

 

A group of PRD legislators in the ALDF, along with Bejarano — all supporters of López Obrador for mayor of Mexico City, came up with a scheme to sell low priced milk, “Leche Betty,” to voters in lower income neighborhoods prior to the national elections.  In this case the milk was provided if and when the consumer, the voter, would affiliate with the PRD so that not only would the party gain their votes in 2000, but also to demographically influence the party’s internal elections and controls prior to the 2000 selection of candidates and the July elections.

 

But Leche Betty it turned out, in its brightly colored and inviting PRD promotional cartons, was a concoction that was not milk at all.  Worse, tests found that the potion was generously laced with fecal sediment.