President López Obrador thinks that Los Pinos, formerly the official residence of Mexico’s president, has been cleansed of the bad vibes left behind by previous occupants.

The cleansing process was accomplished, the president explained yesterday, by opening the mansion to the public and allowing the people to enter. Their presence left the house, occupied by presidents for the last 84 years, purified and clean.

López Obrador places a lot of stock in the power of the people. First they rejected Mexico City’s new airport in a public consultation, a decision the then-president-elect attributed to the fact that “the people are wise.” Now they have the power to rid haunted homes of their ghosts.

He told the first of his daily, 7:00am press conferences yesterday that what cleanses and purifies is the presence of the people.

The president made it clear during the election campaign that he would not live at Los Pinos, because “it has bad vibes and is haunted.”

The residence is to be transformed into a cultural center. “We want to integrate this area into the greater Chapultepec Forest, giving us the largest recreational and cultural space in the country and the world.”

Los Pinos opened to the pubic on Saturday, the day of López Obrador’s inauguration, and it has since proved to be a popular attraction.

As of yesterday, more than 60,000 people had entered its gates.

Source: El Universal (sp)