 |
|
|
 News Around the Republic of Mexico | August 2007 
Mexico's Calderon Breaks Tradition to Dodge Protests
 Miguel Angel Gutierrez - Reuters
go to original
| | Mexican President Felipe Calderon has won plaudits internationally for his war on drug cartels and a rapid pension reform, and his popularity ratings at home are higher than before the election. |
Mexico City - Facing noisy protests by leftist deputies, Mexican President Felipe Calderon has turned his back on Congress and booked a Mexico City concert hall to deliver his first state-of-the-nation speech.
Calderon was due to address Congress and the nation on September 1, but left-wing lawmakers who contest his election win last year vowed to derail the tradition-steeped annual event, as they did a year ago with the outgoing Vicente Fox.
To avoid any rumpus, Calderon will address the nation a day late, on Sept 2, from the Auditorio Nacional concert hall surrounded by supporters from his National Action Party.
On September 1, he will merely hand a printed copy of his speech in to Congress and walk away.
"There is no obligation for the president to use the (congressional) rostrum," Hector Larios, PAN coordinator in the lower house chamber of deputies, told reporters.
For years, the Sept 1. speech was a long event filled with pomp and cheers for the president, from the long-ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party.
It lost some of its shine when President Vicente Fox ended 71 years of one-party rule at elections in 2000. But the September 1 speech is still a highlight of the Mexican political year.
Addressing the nation from a theater, however grandiose, is a break with tradition that might also bode badly for Calderon's hopes of wrapping up negotiations in Congress over a long-awaited tax reform by a September 8 deadline.
Calderon's 9-month-old presidency has been smoother and more productive than many expected when he won power in a razor-thin election contested by leftists who claim he beat their candidate, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, only by fraud.
Calderon has won plaudits internationally for his war on drug cartels and a rapid pension reform, and his popularity ratings at home are higher than before the election.
Yet many leftists still refuse to accept him as president, and had threatened a repeat of last year, when they seized the podium and refused to let Fox deliver his last speech.
The 10,000-seat Auditorio National is one of Latin America's biggest enclosed venues, hosting everything from concerts to Miss Universe contests. |
| |
|
Vallarta Weddings
Tell a Friend
Site Map
Print this Page
Email Us