PRI Politico Tests Public Credulity

(Acapulco, JG 21 January) In yesterday’s session of the State Elections Institute the body took up the question of the false front page of the Jornada Guerrero that circulated two days ago, claiming that PRD candidate Aguirre acknowledged his defeat in the TV debates. The PRI representative before the body, Roberto Torres Aguirre, essentially accused the newspaper itself of having falsified its own front page, trying to denigrate the image of the candidate they endorse. He said that former mayor Felix Salgado Macedonio, a PRD activist and a director of the Jornada Guerrero, was behind the plot because he was jealous of candidate Aguirre and upset because Aguirre had not accepted active support from him. Torres provided no support for his accusation other than his own logic. He was responding to an accusation from the PRD that the false front page was part of the PRI’s “dirty war” tactics. The PRD representative, Rep. Sebastián de la Rosa, indicated that the parties affected will shortly file a formal complaint against the Añorve coalition for the electoral crime. Until such time, the chair ruled that the matter should be tabled.

Press reports do not disclose whether PRI representative Torres really expected the public to believe him when he accused the victims of committing the crime. He may have just been grasping for anything to say in the face of presumptive criminal conduct by the campaign he represents. If he was sincerely hoping that the voters would point their fingers at his adversaries for “shooting themselves in the foot,” his assessment of the intelligence of the public is alarmingly low, even for a politician in the midst of a campaign.