Mexico's left splits amicably for now

After failing yet again to capture the presidency, Mexico's left is undergoing a political divorce as its champion in the last two elections, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, goes his own way. Lopez Obrador shook up Mexican politics on Sunday when he told a rally in the capital that he was quitting the coalition that supported his 2006 and 2012 candidacies and turning his attention to a new faction. The former Mexico City mayor insisted he was leaving the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), the Labor Party (PT) and the Citizens' Movement on amicable terms, and the trio took their comrade's decision in their stride. But tensions are bound to emerge since Lopez Obrador will likely bring loyalists into his new camp. PRD leader Jesus Zambrano said Monday he was confident of "a peaceful separation" since his party had been loyal to Lopez Obrador during his second-place finishes in the last two presidential elections. But the split has been a long-time coming, and it could mean that the left will have more than one candidate vying for the presidency in six years. While Lopez Obrador refuses to recognize the victory of Enrique Pena Nieto in the July 1 election even after the electoral tribunal dismissed his claims of vote-buying, the PRD has decided to accept the ruling. Lopez Obrador urged his supporters to conduct peaceful acts of civil disobedience to defy Pena Nieto, whose Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) ruled Mexico with an authoritarian hand from 1929 to 2000. As the second largest party in congress, the PRD will have to negotiate with Pena Nieto and the PRI in order to get things done in the country. For his part, Lopez Obrador said he would dedicate "work and imagination" to the Movement of National Regeneration (MORENA). During Sunday's rally, he asked supporters to consider transforming MORENA into a new political party. "With his announcement, Lopez Obrador signaled that he would remain in the political arena and stay alive until the next presidential election," political analyst Denise Dresser told MVS radio. "If he hadn't cut ties, it would have been a just matter of time before he would have been at odds with the positions that the PRD will have to take in negotiations within congress and with the (PRI) government," she said. Lopez Obrador lost to Felipe Calderon, of the conservative National Action Party (PAN), by less than one percentage point in 2006. He led massive rallies that paralyzed Mexico City following his defeat but failed to change the outcome. This time around, he lost to Pena Nieto by three million votes but claimed the PRI bought five million votes to steal the election. But the PRD decided to accept the electoral court's decision to uphold the vote on August 31. The divorce will free Lopez Obrador and the PRD to run future campaigns on their own terms, analysts say. Dresser said: "The big question is: Which of these left-wing parties will prevail and which will be the real and efficient counterweight to Pena Nieto?" The impact of this separation could be known when Mexican vote again in congressional elections in 2015. The biggest test will be the 2018 presidential election, with the outgoing mayor of Mexico City, Marcelo Ebrard, and the capital's incoming boss, Miguel Angel Mancera, tipped as the PRD's possible new standard bearers. "Marcelo Ebrard and Miguel Angel Mancera have a great opportunity in front of them to gain visibility and take Lopez Obrador's place," said Irma Mendez, researchers at the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences (FLACSO).