[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 66 (Tuesday, May 24, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: May 24, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                       ELECTORAL REFORM IN MEXICO

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Ohio [Ms. Kaptur] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Ms. KAPTUR. Mr. Speaker, during the debate over NAFTA, important 
questions were raised about the relationship between free trade and 
issues of democracy and human rights. Congress was told time and time 
again that with the promotion of free trade there would be a 
corresponding impetus toward true democracy in Mexico. I wish that I 
could report that there is a light at the end of a very long and dark 
tunnel for the Mexican people.
  Mexico's ruling revolutionary institutional party has maintained 
power since 1929. It continues to maintain exclusive control over 
Mexico's electoral apparatus, including voter registration lists and 
processes, vote tabulation systems, and all bodies responsible for 
election oversight, review, and certification.
  The PRI, as its known in Mexico, has shown little inclination towards 
giving up power. They have selected their candidate for the upcoming 
presidential elections as they always have. The process was more a 
coronation than any pretense towards democracy. Now, the PRi is going 
about the business of making sure their annoited candidate wins the 
election. Again, as in the past, there is little that the PRI will not 
do to make sure that happens.
  The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights of the Organization of 
American States has found Mexico in violation of Article 23 of the 
American Convention on Human Rights, which requires the holding of 
genuine elections that guarantee the free expression of the will of the 
voters.
  The Salinas government talks of the need for political reform. Yet, 
the PRI, the party which Mr. Salinas is the head of, systematically has 
used fraud and intimidation in many of the local elections leading up 
to the presidential election this August. Electoral irregularities and 
fraud were widely reported during elections held in the State of 
Yucatan in December 1993, including voter turnout rates that approached 
or exceeded 100 percent in at least 20 voting districts and a statewide 
electrical power failure as ballots were being counted. Specific 
instances of electoral fraud were also widely reported during elections 
held in the State of Morelos in March 1994, including massive 
manipulation of the electoral registry.
  In the course of the current political campaign, the vicious cycle of 
political violence and corruption in Mexico has already claimed the 
lives in the PRI's first presidential candidate, Luis Donaldo Colosio, 
and subsequently, the police chief of Tijuana who was investigating the 
case. Mr. Colosio, who was a reformist while president of the PRI in 
the late 1980's, was considered to be the candidate with the strongest 
inclination toward political change.
  Police Chief Jose Frederico Benitez Lopez had simply raised doubts 
about the Mexican government's account of the political assassination.
  While the Mexican government has been making promises for electoral 
reform to the United States Government for the past couple of years, 
mainly in order to get NAFTA passed, the Mexican people have heard 
these same promises for decades. Years and years of broken promises 
have piled up. Is it any wonder that the Mexican people doubt their own 
leaders when they talk of reform? Is it any wonder that the Mexican 
people have begun to take matters in their own hands?
  Is it any wonder that there was an uprising in Chiapas? In alarm, the 
Mexican government has tried to placate the people in Chiapas with food 
and offers of land. Mr. Salinas tried to calm the situation by offering 
a pardon to their leader, Subcommandante Marcos. But like Marcos, the 
Mexican people have rejected these offers. Like Marcos, the Mexican 
people have rejected these offers. Like Marcos, the Mexican people are 
no longer interested in more pardons and paternalism.
  The Mexican people are a proud nation. Yet, the Mexican Government 
acts as if they were bestowing a gift to the people when speaking of 
electoral reform. In return for the mere talk of reform, gratitude--and 
silence--is expected.
  People from all over Mexico, like Marcos, are beginning to ask: what 
do the Mexican people have to be grateful for? Of not dying of hunger? 
Of living in one of the slums along the border? Of having to fight for 
what they believe in? For the basic rights of liberty, justice and 
democracy that any free people are entitled to?
  And to whom exactly should they be grateful to? To those Mexican 
elites who for years and years have kept them down? To the U.S. 
corporations who give the Mexican people a couple of dollars for a hard 
day's work? To the Mexican Government for promising everything under 
the Sun but delivering nothing? To the U.S. Government for signing 
NAFTA?
  There is a price to pay for ignoring a people's longstanding calls 
for true democracy and justice as illustrated by the rebellion in 
Mexico's poorest State. Chiapas. The rebellion should serve as a 
reminder to those who set policies and priorities in Mexico--and here 
in the United States as well--that a people wanting change will be 
ignored for only so long.
  This year Mexico is facing one of the most pivotal national elections 
in its history. Mexico now has before it both the opportunity and the 
challenge to achieve desperately needed political and social reforms.
  We, in the United States, have a solemn duty to support this process 
of reform in Mexico. It is not enough to simply enrich big business and 
the Mexican elites through trade agreements like NAFTA. It is our duty 
to see that all people, both Mexican and American, are truly free and 
prosperous. The way the upcoming elections in Mexico are conducted will 
say much about whether that country is on the road to true democracy or 
not.

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