National Electoral Institute (@redpolitica.mx)
On 1 May, a group of hitmen murdered Ulises Fabián Quiroz, the Institutional Revolutionary Party’s (PRI) candidate for the mayorship of Chilapa in the forthcoming elections planned for 7 June. José Santos Valdivia, the substitute choice for the PRI-Green alliance for the same office, refused to continue with the electoral campaign. The candidate for the Movement for National Regeneration (MORENA), Laura Patricia Hernández Carrillo, had just announced days before that she would be suspending her candidacy for security reasons.
On 31 April, the New Alliance Party (PANAL) reported the murder of four of its members as they were returning from a campaign rally in Ixcapuzalco, the municipal center of Pedro Ascención, in the north of the state
Also in April, the gubernatorial candidate for the Citizens’ Movement (MC), Luis Walton Aburto, cancelled his proselytizing tour in the Mountain region, after he had been intercepted together with his cabinet by an armed group in the municipal center of Chilapa de Álvarez.
In mid-March, Aidé Nava González, candidate of the Party for Democratic Revolution (PRD) for the mayorship of Ahuacuotzingo, located below the Mountain region, was found dead in the surroundings of the Tecoanapa community, near where she had been taken by armed subjects days prior.
To date, the authorities believe these violent acts to be localized, and that there still exist the adequate conditions for elections next month.
In a communique published at the beginning of May, the Tlachinollan Mountain Center for Human Rights warned that the “violence has no limits, and the lack of capacity of the authorities to confront it is evident. The political class finds itself trapped within its own labyrinth. It fell into the same claws of the crow that gave birth to it, and it has had to submit itself to the very laws of barbarism which it has itself imposed. Guerrero is a territory mined by violence. There is no place there that escapes control by organized crime […]. The weakness of State institutions contrasts with the strength of criminal organizations, whose power has been demonstrated as being capable of executing local and state authorities. This monster has set down its roots within the very same State structures. It is a central part of the way in which power is exercised, and in which politics take place […]. Violence traps us, and what has disrupted the electoral process is what the authorities have not desired to see and address. They prefer to focus their attention on the social organizations that openly have called for there not to be elections. The State dismisses them for being bold enough to call into question the carrying-out of said elections. It views them as a great threat, and among the most dangerous groups within this electoral situation. The State has not attended to their demands in a profound way: that is, the situations that truly imperil the lives of the people. Nor has it paid attention to the claims that within the political parties candidates develop which respond above all to the interests of organized crime.”
For more information (in Spanish):
Candidatos temen por su seguridad; suplente del PRI-Chilapa rehúye postulación (Excelsior, 5 de mayo de 2015)
Guerrero, en medio de la tormenta. (Centro de derechos humanos de la Montaña Tlachinollan, 5 de mayo de 2015)
Nueva Alianza lamenta el asesinato de cuatro miembros en Guerrero (CNN México, 4 de mayo de 2015)
Sicarios preguntaron por líder criminal antes de ejecutar a candidato en Guerrero (Proceso, 4 de mayo de 2015)
La violencia del narco amenaza las elecciones al sur de México (El País, 4 de mayo de 2015)
“Violencia en Guerrero, focalizada”, Ortega descarta crisis en elecciones(CNN México, 2 de mayo)
Grupo armado intercepta y encañona a Luis Walton en Chilapa (Proceso, 25 de abril de 2015)
Hallan decapitada a precandidata perredista a edil de Ahuacuotzingo (La Jornada, 12 de marzo de 2015)
sipazen.wordpress.com 