Riccardo Pascoe Pierce
The sudden extraction of Mayo Zambada from Mexico has triggered a crisis in the political transition led by AMLO. What was once a smooth and controlled process has now become a transition fraught with severe risks and threats, particularly for the outgoing president. The implications of this event are not limited to the political sphere but also pose severe threats to Mexico.
The first sign of crisis is the fact in itself of the extraction -whatever it may have been- of Mayo Zambada from Mexico. I have no proof, though no doubt, that it was a covert operation organized by U.S. agencies, with the complicity of Mexican security institutions. The most unambiguous indication is the secrecy of the operation, keeping Mexican officialdom completely ignorant of the case. The bewilderment of President Lopez Obrador is proof of this, along with the babbling of the Secretary of Federal Public Security, Rosa Icela Martinez, is a testament to this. It took them absolutely by surprise.
The undercover operation was obviously approved at the highest levels of the U.S. government. The instruction is given when President Biden, now without the ties of candidacy to take care of, has freedom of action that he did not have before. They obviously know what it means to extract Mayo Zambada from Mexico in an open violation of Mexican sovereignty. That is why they have created multiple versions of the incident to mislead the Mexican government and national public opinion. These are smokescreens so that there can be no single version, and there are Mexican authorities who also prefer to maintain their anonymity in this matter.
If it were not enough of a sign of crisis that the leading narco interlocutor with the Mexican government is in the hands of the Americans, irrefutable proof is what comes in Mayo’s letter. It is an extraordinarily well-written letter with a precise order of ideas and well-established objectives. The Mayo letter set the President on a path of confusion. First, he criticized the letter, denied what it said, and forced Sheinbaum to accompany him to defend Governor Rocha. Then he decided that it was not convenient to fight with Zambada and ordered the governor to fire the Sinaloa Prosecutor and reverse the version about the murder of Hector Cuen, now coinciding with the version of the narco in the United States. The governor is in the spotlight for his lies, and whether he can be saved is unclear. In a month and days, will Claudia care for him, as AMLO does?
But what could Zambada’s stay in the U.S. mean for the transition between AMLO and Claudia? Rather, what could it mean for AMLO that Zambada is making confessions about the complicities between the narco and AMLO’s government?
In two consecutive mañaneras, AMLO (acknowledging that his chest is not a wine cellar) has stated: “Everything that is denounced there will have to be proven with evidence”. While he took for granted all the narcos’ claims against García Luna, now he wants proof of everything he thinks they could say about him and his children. This sudden demand for evidence underscores the urgency of AMLO’s response to Zambada’s statements and the potential impact on the political transition.
The fact that Zambada is making statements in the United States makes, for AMLO, even more urgent, two crucial “transformations” for his defense and that of his children. First, he urges the total colonization of the Judicial Power by his followers (Lenia Batres multiplied by thousands) to be his obedient servants. The same that Maduro has achieved in Venezuela, Ortega in Nicaragua, and Díaz Canel in Cuba. Thus, the possibility of any accusation of corruption, links with drug trafficking, or abuse of power against him is limited.
The other crucial “transformation” to avoid any attempt at persecution is the cancellation of the National Institute of Access to Information. Thus, federal agencies will be closed like oysters to any request for information that could harm the former President. And, as if that were not enough, Raquel Buenrostro will be there to guard the procedural goal line, preventing any danger from requests for information from the Mexican public.
In other words, the federal government is ensuring the possibility of “total control” against information leaks that could harm AMLO, his associates, and his family. That control also protects military commanders turned wealthy businessmen and associates linked to businesses originating in the underworld of the Sinaloa and Jalisco cartels.
Plan C is not an ideological program in favor of people experiencing poverty. Plan C is the project of colonization of the State apparatus as a whole to ensure the perpetuation in power of a group of voracious nouveau riche whose horizon is 2050, at least. To stay in power, they partner with the de facto powers of Mexican society, starting with drug trafficking.
The problem AMLO has with Zambada is that international arrest warrants could be issued, as happened to a former President of Honduras, now imprisoned in the United States. Obviously, this eventuality is worrying AMLO. Otherwise, he would not repeat phrases such as “they will have to prove their claims with evidence”. He celebrated the narcos’ statements about García Luna without proof. Today, he is already demanding evidence, and still, nothing has been said about his involvement with drug trafficking, at least publicly. But obviously, AMLO is preparing himself for that eventuality.
A crisis of this magnitude will hit the Mexican economy in its waterline. Ebrard just said, “Do not mix this with trade”, as if insinuating that the economy is a world apart from politics. That is what the 4T would like us to think. But it is a fallacy, close to ignorance. Politics and economics are not separable. Therefore, the continuation of the CUSMA/USMCA/T-MEC is at stake if the practices that lead Mexico to be an authoritarian, unipartisan, and anti-democratic regime are implemented. For example, today, with its hand on its hips, the government “of the transformation” is threatening with the massive firing of striking workers. This is the most evident proof of the authoritarian and anti-democratic thinking that underlies AMLO’s political project.
Only a naive person or someone who does not care about the country could think that the connection between politics and economics does not exist. It is historical materialism 101. Sovereignty is not an issue either. Taking sovereignty to the extreme as an argument leads to postulating an economy isolated from the rest of the world. An autarkic country when 20 million Mexicans live in the United States is closing our eyes to reality. It is sovereignty turned into a helpful fantasy only to deceive fools.
Back to the origin: the covert operation of the United States and some Mexican authorities to get Mayo Zambada out of the country. The threat seems clear to me. If Mexico continues along the path of wanting to consolidate an authoritarian, repressive, and dictatorial regime, it is most likely that within a few weeks or months, there will be international arrest warrants against AMLO and his associates.
The “traditional friendship between countries” will be broken with such a regime in Mexico. Anything is possible.
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