Mexico’s Federal Electoral Institute (IFE), the arbiter of
electoral law in Mexico, has concluded that Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO)
and his leftist political coalition overspent on last year’s presidential
campaign by 62,766,642 pesos and 80 centavos (we’ll round it to US$4.85
million).
Still a blurry picture (soure/fuente: IFE)
As a penalty for the violation, the coalition party members PRD
(Democratic Revolutionary Party), PT (Workers’ Party) and Movimiento Ciudadano
(Citizens’ Movement), are being eye-balled for fines of up to 129 million pesos (US$10.1 million).
IFE’s draft resolution made a point of calling out the
falseness of the coalition’s claim to honesty, and accusing it of having a
parallel financing system.
Sloppiness and
inefficiency created the perfect climate for corruption – or at best honest
miscalculation. IFE noted that there were errors in the distribution of campaign
funds at the presidential level, and also for congressmen and senators. Some
expenditures were reported and poorly recorded, resulting in the “irregularities”
that put the final number over the top of the spending limit, which had been
set at 336 million pesos (US$26.33 million).
Wednesday, January 30 will be a big day for IFE. At that
time the organization’s General Council will deliver its consolidated opinion,
which acts as a general overview of the spending practices of all the big
parties and their leaders in last year’s election: Enrique Peña Nieto
(PRI-PVEM), Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (PRD, PT and Citizens’ Movement), Josefina
Vázquez Mota (PAN) and Gabriel Quadri Tower (New Alliance Party).
(TE Wilson is the author of Mezcalero, a Detective Sánchez novel.)
Twitter: @TimothyEWilson
Email: lapoliticaeslapolitica [at] gmail [dot] com
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