eNapoleón Gómez Urrutia, head of the Mexican Miners and Metal Smelters Union. Photo: veracruzenlasnoticas.com By RICARDO CASTILLO The wheel of fortune has made a full circle for Mexican Senator Napoleón Gómez Urrutia. In 2006, Gómez Urrutia, then — and still — leader of the Mexican Miners and Metal Smelters Union, fled Mexico Canada-bound, charged with a $55 million embezzlement of union funds. Had he
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By RICARDO CASTILLO Mexico’s new brand of diplomacy is about to undergo its first acid test. On Friday, Jan. 4, the Foreign Relations ministers or secretaries of the 14 Latin American nations that make up the Lima Group (a multilateral body that was established following the Lima Declaration on Aug. 8, 2017, in the Peruvian capital under which representatives of 17 countries
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By RICARDO CASTILLO First, let me explain some Mexican meanings for the word “chocolate.” Chocolate is Mexico’s sweetest gift to humanity. That, however, does not mean that Mexicans use the word chocolate just to refer to confectionaries. In Mexican slang, chocolate can mean the contrary of sweet – bitterness or outright anger. Take, for instance, the phrase used in the title of
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By RICARDO CASTILLO Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s (AMLO) daily, Monday-through-Friday, 7 a.m. press conferences at National Palace downtown Mexico City are paying off. Every morning, he gets hold of the nation’s mike to clear out the daily barrage of misunderstandings about his administration. In short, every morning, AMLO gets to wash the dirty dishes caused usually by his personnel and.
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By THÉRÈSE MARGOLIS Although it seems that most national and international financial analysts who have reviewed newly instated Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s (AMLO) 2019 national budget have deemed it as “credible” and “helpful for investors’ sentiments,” there are at least some incongruences in the proposed financial plan. The budget, which was presented to Congress by Mexican Finance Secretary
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By RICARDO CASTILLO The change over of presidents in Mexico is always a formal event, and this time was no exception, except for the fact that the style of doing things has changed. Some, if not all, of the stiff formality of yesteryear was absent in the proceedings that took place on Saturday, Dec. 1. The real change of administrations
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By RICARDO CASTILLO It was 30 years ago that Mexico took a veritable turn towards becoming a democratic system. At the time, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) still ruled the nation. Yet the man who became president on Dec. 1, 1988, Carlos Salinas de Gortari, noticed that the lights had changed and that the PRI had to let go of
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By RICARDO CASTILLO Three curious things happened during the first week of Mexico’s 64th Congress with the Green Ecologist Party of Mexico (PVEM) known for short as the Green Party. The Green Party, or whatever’s left of it, is now administered by former Senator and now-Deputy Carlos Puente, who during the introduction of the new parties last Sept. 1 at the
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By RICARDO CASTILLO The new Chamber of Deputies president, Porfirio Muñoz Ledo, is a master of political discourse and parliamentary procedures. During the “installation” (to use the Mexican term for inauguration) of the two houses of Congress last Saturday, Sept. 1, Porfirio, at age 85, presided over the inaugural process of the 64th Legislature. And in so doing, he showed his experience
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