Tag Archives: Lopez Obrador

Mexico suggests work visas for Central Americans, wants U.S. to do same

Mexico's new President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador holds a news conference at National Palace in Mexico City, Mexico December 3, 2018. REUTERS/Edgard Garrido

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador proposed on Wednesday offering more work visas for Central Americans and said the United States should do the same, part of a negotiation aimed at stemming the northward flow of migrants.

Lopez Obrador, who took office on Saturday, said he would discuss immigration with U.S. President Donald Trump in coming days, including increasing investment in southern Mexico and Central America.

“We are proposing investment in productive projects and in job creation, and not only that, also work visas for Mexico and for the United States,” he told a news conference, saying he would give more details “soon.”

Mexico and the United States have been in talks about how to manage the large groups moving through Mexico in caravans, with Lopez Obrador pushing for investment to address the poverty and crime that drive thousands of people every year from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala.

Lopez Obrador, soon after being elected in July, sent a letter to Trump suggesting they work together to address the root causes of immigration.

“It is very important to us that we reach an investment agreement between companies and governments, to create jobs in Central America and our country,” he said.

Lopez Obrador plans major infrastructure projects in the impoverished south of Mexico including his home state of Tabasco. He says those plans, including a refinery and two railways will provide jobs to Mexicans and Central Americans.

He did not reply when asked if his government was considering a U.S. proposal to return Central American asylum seekers to Mexican territory while U.S. courts processed their cases, saying only that their rights would be respected.

The arrival of several thousand Central Americans in Mexico’s border city of Tijuana about a month ago prompted Trump to mobilize the U.S. Army to beef up border security, while restricting the number of asylum applications accepted per day.

While overall illegal immigration across the U.S.-Mexico border is much lower than it was 20 years ago, there are more Central Americans, families and asylum seekers than in the past.

Some migrants clambered over a tall fence to cross into the United States from Tijuana on Tuesday, hoping to speed their asylum applications by turning themselves over to U.S. Border Patrol officials.

(Reporting by Frank Jack Daniel, Writing by Daina Beth Solomon; Editing by Steve Orlofsky and Peter Cooney)

Mexico ruling party says rules aimed at stopping rise of left

Enrique Ochoa Reza, Chairman of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) arrives to give his speech during their national assembly ahead of the 2018 election at Mexico City’s Palacio de los Deportes, Mexico August 12, 2017.

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Rules adopted by Mexico’s ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party to allow it to form coalitions and non-members to run for president were necessary to stop leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador from winning office next year, its president said.

The rules adopted over the weekend give the once-dominant party, known as PRI, a better chance of clinging to power in the July presidential election, where veteran leftist Lopez Obrador is an early favorite among voters tired of graft scandals, violence and a tepid economy.

Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador speaks during a news conference in Mexico City, Mexico June 9, 2017.

File photo: Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador speaks during a news conference in Mexico City, Mexico June 9, 2017. REUTERS/Henry Romero

PRI President Enrique Ochoa called Lopez Obrador “the enemy to beat,” repeating a long-standing refrain by Mexico’s ruling class that he would wreck the economy with Venezuelan-style policies.

“He is the threat for Mexico going forward,” Ochoa said in an interview on Foro TV. “We don’t want to have the same fate as Venezuela, with food shortages, the highest inflation in the world and GDP falling by 7 percent.”

Since last year, Mexico has been more concerned about a possible rupture of trade ties with the United States under Donald Trump than domestic politics, but the government has grown confident in recent months that talks starting this week in Washington will not end the North American Trade Agreement, which underpins much of Mexico’s economy.

Lopez Obrador recently denied having anything to do with the Venezuelan government. On the two previous occasions that the former Mexico City mayor ran for president, his opponents used the same strategy of comparing him with Venezuela’s socialists.

Ochoa said the new party rules allowed any future PRI president-elect to form coalitions to “foment governability.” He did not rule out alliances with any major party, beyond saying coalitions should be with those the centrist PRI could identify with ideologically.

Party veteran Mario Fabio Beltrones proposed allowing coalitions. The rules allowing non-party members to run for president are widely seen as favoring Finance Minister Jose Antonio Meade, a technocrat untainted by the corruption scandals that have eroded the popularity of Pena Nieto’s government.

Meade has served in governments of both the PRI and the conservative opposition National Action Party. He is not a member of either party.

 

(Reporting by Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)