World

Mexico’s Self-Fashioned Messiah

By Dale Hurd
CBN News

CBN.com – MEXICO CITY, Mexico - Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador -- some believe he is Mexico's messiah. Others say he is Washington's next problem in Latin America.

Lopez Obrador is the former mayor of Mexico City and the consistent leader in the polls heading into Sunday's presidential election.

And depending on who you talk to, Lopez Obrador is either a mythic figure who will purify Mexican politics and deliver the nation from corruption and poverty, or he's simply the next anti-American dictator in Latin America, and a danger to Mexico's democracy and economy.

Mexico's young democracy finds itself at a crossroads, and there is a real fear that Lopez Obrador will take the nation down the wrong road, and into a new, more confrontational relationship with the United States.

Ulises Beltran is a leading pollster in Mexico. He said, “Make no mistake: If Lopez Obrador wins this election, the relationship with the United States is going to be rough.

“Lopez Obrador doesn't own a passport,” Beltran said. “He's been out of the country only twice, to Cuba. He doesn't speak a word of English. And I think he thinks that all of the evils of Mexico come from the abusive capitalist system of the United States.”

Obrador's opponents have compared him to Venezuela's anti-American President Hugo Chavez:

The leftist Obrador has vowed to cancel parts of the North American Free Trade Agreement that he thinks harm Mexico. And in a not-so-veiled warning to the United States, Obrador said, "We're going to be careful to not meddle in the internal life of other countries…because we are not going to permit them to meddle in the internal affairs of our country."

But the Obrador campaign does not have an overtly anti-American flavor. It's about Mexico.

Andres Roemer, a Mexican news commentator and host of Proyecto 40 on Mexico's TV Azteca network, believes Mexico's new system of checks and balances will protect Mexican democracy.

“He's not a schmuck, and he understands that good relations with the United States, in the end, is in the best interests of Mexico,” Roemer said. “Mexico is not like Venezuela. So even if he is like Hugo Chavez, we cannot underestimate the (political) institutions of Mexico, the people of Mexico, and our proximity to the United States…”

That need to keep those relations open with the United States may keep Lopez Obrador from creating a de facto dictatorship.

Political analyst Luis Rubio said, “He understands full well that the U.S sits next door and that will not go away. He would rather have a more distant relationship. He does not see the U.S. as a solution to Mexico's problems…but he would not bring about the black-and-white alternative in closeness with Chavez and Castro.”

The U.S. needs a stable and friendly Mexico. It's the second largest oil supplier to the United States, and a major political or economic crisis could send even more Mexicans toward the U.S border.

Obrador has held a razor- thin lead over Felipe Calderon of President Vincente Fox's National Action Party. Calderon, more of an American-style market conservative, wants to strengthen relations with the U.S. and Canada.

But many Mexicans no longer see increased ties with the United States as the solution. Mexicans have also become disgusted with what has become a very negative campaign.

One man told us "…All politicians steal, but maybe Obrador will steal less."

"I'm disappointed in them all," a woman said.

Another man said, "All the candidates are dirty, so it's a matter of voting for the least bad."

The key to understanding the appeal of Lopez brador is that neither he nor his supporters view him as just another candidate. Writer Enrique Krauze has spent time with Obrador and says he has what some would call, in political terms, a Messiah complex.

Krauze said, “I think he really believes -- and many people believe what he believes -- that he is Mexico's messiah. Lopez Obrador, in a very famous television interview, compared himself to Jesus. He drew the parallel. There are banners saying ‘Mexico needed a messiah,’ using the word (messiah), and Mexico has found it in Lopez Obrador.’"

Calderon has warned that an Obrador victory will mean big government programs and might well create economic chaos. And that could send waves of fresh illegal aliens over America's south border.

But some believe the real nightmare scenario is a narrow Obrador defeat. Because in the past, when Obrador has lost, there were demonstrations, and some fear that this time, millions of angry protesters claiming vote fraud could fill the streets.

Rubio says the election has created a dangerous situation, because in his view, there is too much at stake, and the winner could decide Mexico's fate for the next 10 or 20 years.

“And that's something I don't think any democracy should be asking its citizens to decide in a single vote,” said Rubio, “and that makes it extremely dangerous, precisely for that reason.”

Roemer said, ”This is a very important moment of what kind of country we will have.”

And we'll soon know the future that Mexico has chosen.

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