Mon, May 11, 2009 page9

• Swine influenza is injected into Mexican politics

  • By Marc Lacey and Elisabeth Malkin / NY TIMES NEWS SERVICE
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  The slumping economy and the bloody drug war had been Mexican voters’ top worries ahead of midterm elections in July. Then the mysterious A(H1N1) virus gave Mexicans the scare of their lives and made those who did not end up in a hospital bed — or a grave — feel fortunate.

  Pollsters, who had found Mexican President Felipe Calderon’s governing National Action Party lagging before the flu virus hit, are scrambling back into the field to see how the influenza outbreak may have changed the dynamics of the election season. Did Calderon’s government overreact? Or did it skillfully manage the crisis and keep deaths down?

  “When there’s a big economic crisis, until it gets very bad, it’s hard to find evidence that people in power are hurt,” said Daniel Lund, a pollster and the president of the MUND Group, which is conducting focus groups on the flu’s effects. “In a natural disaster, the ruling party is hurt with a slow or corrupt response. When it comes to the flu, we’ve never really seen anything like this.”

  The campaign had shown early signs of dirtiness, with rival parties accusing one another of drug cartel connections. But as far as sanitation goes, this may prove to be the cleanest campaign in history. The Ministry of Health has urged the candidates vying for a variety of local, state and federal positions on July 5 to take precautions, including using antibacterial hand gel liberally, to avoid spreading the influenza virus.

  Large political rallies — anything more than 40 people — are discouraged and closed-door strategy sessions should allow a generous 2m between every attendee. Candidates are urged not to wear neckties because they are viewed as potential carriers of viruses. Baby kissing — or any kissing — is frowned upon, as are handshakes.

  The outbreak has already had one political effect. Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard, who is a potential presidential contender in 2012, made his first trip to Los Pinos, the presidential residence, in the three years since Calderon was elected.

  Ebrard’s Democratic Revolution Party, known as the PRD, disputed Calderon’s narrow election victory in 2006 and the mayor barely acknowledged the president thereafter. During much of the flu crisis, Ebrard held his own news conferences and issued his own decrees, including the closing of Mexico City’s restaurants.

  At a meeting convened by Calderon last Monday, however, there was Ebrard (albeit wearing a surgical mask) at the same table as the president.

  After he was criticized for lying low as the virus multiplied, Calderon made two televised addresses to the nation in recent days. At the event with Ebrard and governors from throughout the country, the president tried to preempt criticism that his government had overreacted to the flu.

  “Without a doubt, the timely and decided reaction of everybody, of all the authorities in the country, has saved not only thousands of lives in Mexico, but it has allowed the rest of the world to take the right measures and prepare themselves better, with a long lead time, with more information to face this epidemic,” Calderon said.

  Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, Calderon’s challenger in 2006, flouted the restriction on rallies this week in the southern state of Tabasco, where his Web site says he drew 2,000 people.

  “The usurper government has abandoned the people and for that simple reason these epidemics affect the Mexican people,” Obrador said.

  Early polling indicates support for the government’s actions, although the skepticism that many Mexicans have for any politician’s utterances is clearly evident too, said Jose Antonio Crespo, an analyst at CIDE, a Mexico City research institute.

  Especially now that scientists are saying that the flu may not prove as fierce as originally thought, some Mexicans are questioning whether sequestering themselves with masks for a week was necessary.

  “The truth is the government exaggerated,” Georgina Moreno Montemayor, 27, an accountant, said last Monday as the government announced the gradual reopening of schools and the return to something more resembling normal life.

  Moreno said some Mexicans were even questioning whether the virus was real at all or more like the Chupacabras, a mythical monster that sucks goats’ blood.

  Because of its close links with the US, Mexico was already one of the hardest hit countries by the global economic recession, with central bankers estimating a contraction of 3.8 percent to 4.8 percent this year. The flu outbreak will worsen the economy, shaving an additional 0.3 percent to 0.5 percent off GDP, officials said.

  At least for now, influenza has managed to overshadow the drug war, which continues to cause heavy casualties. If nothing else, though, the government’s aggressive response to the flu may dispel the notion that drug gangs have Mexico tottering on the edge of collapse.

  With big rallies curtailed, campaigns are pouring more money into virtual outreach through the Internet and even text messages. While candidates continue to espouse proposals to revive the economy and increase security, they are clearly trying to use the health crisis to their advantage, some shamelessly so.

  Hand gels and face masks have become the new free items handed out by office seekers, trumping T-shirts and baseball hats. In some cases, candidates have even stamped the masks with their names and party logos, turning voters’ faces into mobile campaign billboards.

  Barbara Botella, an opposition candidate for mayor of Leon, a large industrial city in the central Mexican state of Guanajuato, began her campaign last week wearing a mask printed with the slogan “Barbara, en boca de todos” or “Barbara, on everybody’s lips.”

  She happened to wear it incorrectly as far as reducing flu transmission goes, covering her mouth but not her nose.

  In an interview, she accused the governing party, known as PAN, of exploiting the flu crisis. She portrayed her own approach as one intended to merely let voters know that she would be prepared to handle any fallout from the outbreak.

  In a newspaper commentary published last Tuesday, PAN’s national president, German Martinez Cazares, dismissed the idea that politics had entered into the government’s response.
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