Mexico, the nightmare that refuses to give up hope

Mexico faces its ghosts once more in the midst of winds of change. The International Book Fair of Guadalajara has started this Saturday with the relay of the mexican Government on the horizon. In a week, Andrés Manuel López Obrador will assume eventually the presidency after a long transition period of five months. The country waits for new answers to age-old problems: poverty, violence, corruption, in addition to the perennial inequality. The promise of the future, although uncertain, implies a certain hope concerning the legacy left by the Administration of Enrique Peña Nieto. “We're already living the worst ends possible... it Is very difficult to think that we could be worse”, noted the writer, Antonio Ortuño in a table convened by THE COUNTRY, in which also participated the actor Diego Luna, the journalist Denise Maerker and the writer Fernanda Melchor.

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The uncertainty has been placed as a factor that prevents a clear view of the start of the time López Obrador. Some fear has been installed in the environment despite the fact that the contradictory legacy of the PRI in Mexico, leaves economic stability in the most violent year in its history and a commitment to an agenda of modernizing in a country with 53 million poor people. These challenges nuanced expectations about the mandate of the Movement of Regeneration National (Morena). “The hardest thing is the break of the hope. So we have lived the mexican people for centuries,” said Melchor, who is the author of hurricane Season (Random House, 2017).

Maerker believes that there is not a single person in Mexico in a condition of poverty “to be afraid” for what lies ahead in the new Government because “whatever can be better,” said the driver of the main informative of Televisa in the table moderated by Javier Moreno, director of THE COUNTRY America. “The hope is cyclical in Mexico and the PRI was the master of the hope. Every six years we changed from president to renew this ritual... Now Lopez Obrador has assumed the full responsibility of what is Pashacasino happening to you go generating that hope.”

Diego Luna believes that the arrival of a Government of the left also presents an opportunity for the civil society. “The policy by the citizens, not just politicians,” said the actor. “The worst thing we can do is to stay sitting during the six years of the Government. This era requires us to get involved because if not, what will happen can be a tragedy,” added the filmmaker, who presented during the electoral process the day after, a citizens ' initiative to minimize political polarization and find common ground for voters.

The vices of the mexican system are those that have discouraged social mobilization. “The history of social movements in Mexico is the history of the repression of the social movements. The State has always worked to repress,” says Ortuño, in reference to the dissent of sectors such as the doctor or the railroads, which were crushed when they lifted up their voice against the hegemonic party, the PRI. “That discourages a little social participation”, he ironises the author of Mexico. And adds: “Mexico is a nightmare that is lived to the taste... Are created microscales in which you're always on top of someone else.”

That has done to the mexican people see with natural inequality —“It's brutal to accept that we benefit from it!!!”, said Moon— and, above all, corruption. “It is not genetic in the mexican, but yes, it is a lubricating oil of the political class,” said Maerker, who called it “revolutionary,” the proposal of López Obrador of trust in the citizens in payment of taxes, and the purpose of inspections to the business. “I do not know of a single case in the world where this has worked, but it is believing in others in a society that mistrusts the other.”

Moon underlined that this evil is not a common language among mexicans. “I know some families that when we talk about corruption, we do not understand,” said the actor. The ethical boundaries separating someone gives you a bite to get a drug from a governor that diverts hundreds of millions of dollars to steal elections. “You have to be very careful of how we talk about the corruption in the country because the problem is inequality, not corruption”.

The talk organized by this newspaper added a new ghost to the collection of spectra that transfixed the country. “The State is an empty shell that has been filled with interests of criminals, business...Is a farce in which private interests are disguised as collective interests,” said Maerker. Ortuño called it a “zombie Status”, the walking dead, which revives from time to time in force in an environment of hiperviolencia. “It is difficult to find a case of violence in Mexico in the not involved the police or expolicías, military or former military, officials or former officials...There are people that if you have put on the uniform is a police officer and if you do not have it, it is a hitman,” said the author, a native of Guadalajara. Despite all this, Mexico is a country where hope breaks through.