Mud was flung in all political directions Wednesday, the last valid day for electioneering in the states of Coahuila, State of Mexico, Nayarit and Veracruz.
It really grabs an objective observer’s attention (like yours truly) that the greatest majority of the mud was aimed at Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO), leader of political party National Regeneration Movement (Morena).
A large cadre of political columnists ran the long list of defects affecting AMLO in his public performance in a script that has become all too familiar over the many years he’s been seeking the presidency of Mexico and speaking against “the corrupt mafia in power” led nowadays by none other than President Enrique Peña Nieto himself.
Throngs of well-known columnists Wednesday badmouthed AMLO using a script that — don’t take my word for it — is probably being distributed by the Interior Secretariat (Segob) in order to influence the outcome of next Sunday’s elections, in which the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) is running on shaky grounds. Where else could so much anti-AMLO publicity come from?
But the straw that broke the camel’s back for the official and apparently government sponsored smear campaign against AMLO and all the candidates he is supporting in the four states with elections is the Eva Cadena case.
Eva Cadena used to be a Morena candidate for mayor in the municipality of Las Choapas before she hit the public scene last April as a woman who was video-taped receiving cash for AMLO on several occasions and with different amounts usually handed out to her by people not seen in the video but who insist that the money must end up in AMLO’s hands.
Cadena, who has been kicked out of Morena obviously for lack of loyalty, has insisted that she “was used” by Morena officials in Veracruz to “wash their faces” and “as an alibi to hide many irregularities they do, because the problem way deep down is that all political parties use additional resources to those they receive from the electoral authorities, and Morena is not an exception.
Many at Morena have pointed out that current Veracruz state Gov. Miguel Ángel Yunez Linares is behind all the mysterious videos in which she is seen raising illegal funds for Morena. Gov. Yunez Linares has kept mum on this accusation but clearly he hates AMLO’s (and Morena’s) guts and it’s not unlikely that he’s the puppeteer pulling Eva Cadena’s strings.
The worst part came on Wednesday when Eva Cadena went on to an incredulous press to “clean up her image” because she claims she’s been very much maligned by this whole affair, particularly now that literally the entire Morena leadership has turned their back on her.
What’s not understandable is what Eva Cadena wanted, particularly knowing that she’s discredited as a blatant liar and Wednesday, first during a press conference and then during a Milenio television interview, she refused to identify the people handing her hundreds of thousands of pesos in cash. Then she blamed Morena of the videos being “manipulated.” But on several occasions she refused to identify the people handing over the case which she claims she eventually gave back, because that money was not accepted by Morena officials in the state of Veracruz.
“When I was with them, they insisted many times that I receive the cash. They even told me that they wouldn’t like to travel by road with that money in the state of Veracruz due to insecurity. So, under pressure by the unexpected situation, I accepted the resources on the condition that I would find party conducts to have that money get there,” namely, to AMLO himself.
Several times Eva refused to say who “they” were.
Another question was why wait until May 31, the last valid day to influence the municipal elections in Veracruz — and why not, the State of Mexico, Coahuila and Nayarit? She then also failed to answer directly, beating around the bush that she was all alone and looking after her “smeared dignity.”
Many a journalists claims this is a “montage” staged by the many enemies of AMLO and that Eva Cadena a self-confessed former National Action Party (PAN) member.
AMLO stated while on campaign in Piedras Negras, Coahuila, a city that borders Eagle Pass, Texas, that Veracruz Gov. Yunez Linares “is using her to stain our movement” in tandem with “the mafia in power” including many a Mexico City columnist in the last day of the campaign.
Definitely the Eva Cadena scam bubble burst open punctured by Cadena herself.
Now we go into the lull before the election and for everyone’s good, the mud-slinging stopped Wednesday midnight.
