To reveal possible links between organized crime and former presidents Vicente Fox and Felipe Calderón, the president of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, urged the former Secretary of Security, Genaro García Luna, convicted of drug trafficking in the United States.
“There is the possibility that García Luna declares himself as a witness and I would say, as president of Mexico, for the good of the country, that he hopefully does so in exchange for reporting on whether he received orders or informed the former presidents, both to ( Vicente) Fox like (Felipe) Calderón,” said the leftist president during his usual morning press conference.
The anti-drug czar of the Calderón government (2006-2012) was found guilty Tuesday in New York of receiving million-dollar bribes for the Sinaloa cartel to send tons of drugs to the United States between 2001 and 2012.
García Luna also led a Mexican agency equivalent to the US FBI during the Fox administration (2000-2006).
Calderón, who after the verdict denied having agreed with criminals, and Fox belong to the opposition party PAN (right).
“What is the explanation that you are going to give to the people of Mexico about why you named García Luna?” López Obrador questioned, addressing Calderón.
López Obrador considered that “it would be very good” if the so-called “super policeman” provides information that contributes to the fight against drugs and to break the ties between politicians and criminals, regardless of whether he thereby achieves a reduction in his sentence, which will be announced on 27 June and could be up to life in prison.
He also asked for clarification if US authorities knew about García Luna’s dealings with the cartel of Joaquín “Chapo” Guzmán, sentenced to life imprisonment in that country.
“It can’t be that they didn’t know either”launched the president, recalling that the former minister received recognition from US officials.
García Luna, a 54-year-old mechanical engineer, is the highest-ranking former Mexican official to sit on the US justice bench.
After the jury’s decision, Calderón assured in a letter that his government fought the cartels like no other, while Fox criticized the security strategy of López Obrador, whose critics maintain that he evades the prosecution of drug traffickers.
“The worst alliance with crime is to give them hugs and greet them in their dens,” Fox said on Twitter.
Mexico has accumulated some 340,000 homicides and tens of thousands of disappeared since Calderón launched a US-sponsored anti-drug offensive in 2006 with the participation of the Mexican military.
Both the PAN and the PRI and PRD opponents, who aspire to return to power in the 2024 presidential elections, remain silent about García Luna’s guilt.
In contrast, the leader of the ruling Morena party, Mario Delgado, announced that he will ask the electoral body to withdraw the registration of the PAN, which would prevent him from participating in the elections, but López Obrador, whose popularity is around 60%, distanced himself from that idea.
“A criminal organization cannot continue aspiring to participate in politics and want to continue governing,” he said.
Analysts such as Juan Carlos Piña, a security expert, consider that the ruling against García Luna “hurts the institutions a lot” and could hit the opposition’s aspirations to take over from the left next year.
The verdict “very much contributes to the government’s discourse because reason does not cease to assist in the fact that corruption had escalated to very high levels. The way in which the party in power capitalizes on it will surely have an impact on the voter “, declared Piña, a law professor at the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education./AFP