Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. Photo: presidencia.gob.mx

PULSE NEWS MEXICO

After a series of articles were published in serious newspapers the day before noting how his children had been involved in awarding juicy government contracts to their friends, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) shot back at reporters on Thursday, May 4, proclaiming that his kids were not corrupt and adding that the 100 million pesos that they were accused of taking is practically “nothing.”

During his daily press conference Thursday, AMLO said that the news reports showing how a group of companies of friends of his son Andrés López López Beltrán have obtained federal government contracts for more than 100 million pesos were misleading.

López Obrador went on to say that the alleged amount of 100 million pesos “is nothing” in terms of government contracts.

“The contracts must exist, but my children have nothing to do with them,” he said.

“My children are not corrupt, unlike (Carlos) Loret de Mola (who first revealed the evidence about the contracts in his Latinus news portal).”

AMLO went on to call Loret de Mola a practitioner of “mercenary journalism for profit.”

“Do the math, look at the report. It’s nothing (the amount of 100 million pesos),” AMLO said.

“This is slander (against my kids). There is no conflict of interest, nothing, absolutely nothing. There is no problem. Just because the friend’s cousin of the sister is a friend of Andrés. So what? Nothing. See for yourselves.”

According to a Latinus report, there are three companies associated with AMLO’s sons that have obtained various public contracts from the federal government: AZ Project Management, Organismo Promotor Logístico and VEA Arquitectos. All three are registered to the same address: Veracruz 69 in Mexico City’s Colonia Condesa, and they have four other subcompanies.

Related to the members of those firms are Alejandro Castro Jiménez Labora; Santiago Jiménez Labora Prieto, the cousin of the former; and Diego Jiménez Labora Prieto, Santiago’s brother, all of whom are close friends of López Beltran, as documented with photographs from their social media accounts showing them with the president’s son at numerous events and parties.