Ricardo Pascoe Pierce
Let’s imagine María Corina Machado’s visit to President Claudia Sheinbaum at the National Palace. It would have sparked intense scrutiny. What was Machado’s intention in going to the National Palace? What would have been Sheinbaum’s intention in agreeing to receive her? Had they decided to seek common ground for understanding?
The conversation would undoubtedly have been difficult for both of them, given their conflicting political positions on Venezuela. The Mexican government has supported Chavismo-Madurismo since 2018. As a government, it appointed a Mexican ambassador who moves between his affiliation with both Morena and the United Socialist Party of Venezuela. Mexico does not admit that Maduro committed electoral fraud to remain in power and recognizes him as the legitimate president of Venezuela.
Machado, on the other hand, believes she exposed electoral fraud by the Maduro regime by presenting election results from more than 60% of ballot boxes, along with their respective ballots. The opposition won the presidential election by a wide margin. Therefore, she wanted to explain to the Mexican president the reasons and justifications for the popular resistance against Maduro’s dictatorial regime. Wasn’t it a more than justified cause to resist in defense of the thousands of political prisoners and hundreds of deaths that have occurred since the post-election mobilizations?
Surely, María Corina Machado would have reminded Claudia Sheinbaum of what the PRD-Morena did when they felt aggrieved by the conduct of the governments and parties in power. Had she forgotten that López Obrador occupied Reforma Avenue for weeks on end, precisely because of complaints and allegations about what they considered to have been electoral fraud?
Sheinbaum would have explained to her that being on the streets is not the same as being in power, representing a country. She harangued Machado about Mexico’s historic stance on conflicts in third countries: respect for the rights of others is peace. And she added: Mexico opposes intervention in the affairs of other peoples, as it is up to them to resolve their differences internally. Mexico opposes any kind of interventionism. Based on these considerations, it is not in a position to support dissent against any government, especially a Latin American government. On this basis, she made it clear to Machado that when she stated that she had no opinion on either the Nobel Peace Prize or the internal situation in Venezuela, she was maintaining the position of the Mexican State.
Without seeking a bitter or difficult confrontation, Machado pointed out cases in which the Mexican government, both in the previous six-year term and in the current one, has intervened in the internal affairs of other countries, including high-profile cases such as the rescue of Evo Morales with a Mexican Air Force plane. She also recalled the case of the deposed Peruvian president, Pedro Castillo, and his family and associates, or that of the former Ecuadorian vice president, accused of corruption in his country but granted asylum in the Mexican embassy in Quito. She even commented on the well-known support for the presidential candidate’s campaign, the movement linked to the president of Honduras, and an ally of Morena.
Machado presented three examples to insist to Sheinbaum that Mexico’s selfless support for the Venezuelan opposition’s struggle to return their country to the path of democracy would be of great help to the people suffering at the hands of the Maduro regime. Sheinbaum did not budge from her position, knowing that her support for Maduro’s government is unwavering, even though it was a conversation between two women. But the president received Carlos Manzo’s widow, Grecia Quiroz, at the National Palace, one day after her husband’s murder, and demanded that she calm down, insinuating that the former mayor had brought about his own murder. Days after that meeting, Quiroz received death threats, just like her husband. Neither Machado nor Quiroz could persuade Sheinbaum to budge an inch from her position in support of Maduro or to reconcile with a municipal policy that refuses to bow to the president and Morena.
For all these reasons and more, this meeting between these two women never happened and never will.
@rpascoep
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