The Broad Front for Mexico (FAM) opposition bloc has trimmed its field of potential presidential candidates from four to three, eliminating former tourism minister Enrique de la Madrid.
The organizing committee of the FAM – made up of the National Action Party (PAN), the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and the Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) – announced Tuesday that Xóchitl Gálvez, Beatriz Paredes and Santiago Creel fared best in polling and will thus pass to the third stage of the alliance’s candidate selection process.
PAN Senator Gálvez attracted the support of 38.3% of 6,000 poll respondents, while PRI Senator Beatriz Paredes had the backing of 26%.
Creel, who has taken leave as a federal deputy to focus on becoming the FAM’s presidential candidate, was supported by 20.1% of those polled.
De la Madrid, who served as tourism minister in the second half of the 2012-18 government led by former president Enrique Peña Nieto, congratulated the three remaining aspirants in a social media post and said he was convinced that a “much better Mexico is possible.”
He, Gálvez, Paredes and Creel were the only FAM aspirants who met the requirements to reach the second stage of the opposition bloc’s candidate selection process, which lasted less than a week.
The FAM organizing committee said in a statement Tuesday that 3,000 people were polled in person at their homes and 3,000 other people responded to telephone surveys between August 11 and 14 to gauge support for the four presidential hopefuls.
It noted that the first of five regional forums in which the three remaining aspirants will participate will take place in Durango city this Thursday at 8 p.m.
“In the forum called ‘Living in Mexico and exercising rights’ the aspirants will present their visions and ideas on questions of security and justice, the anti-corruption system and the fight against impunity and rights for a decent life,” the committee said, adding that the event will be streamed live on the social media pages of the FAM, the PAN, the PRI and the PRD.
The three-party opposition bloc is scheduled to announce the winner of its selection process on Sept. 3 after additional polling and a direct vote in which registered citizens can participate.
Gálvez, an indigenous Otomí woman born into a family of modest means in Hidalgo, is the clear frontrunner in the FAM race, but polls indicate that the leading aspirants to the ruling Morena party’s nomination, former Mexico City mayor Claudia Sheinbaum and ex-foreign affairs minister Marcelo Ebrard, are significantly more popular than her.
A field of six aspirants is competing for the presidential election nomination of the alliance led by Morena, with the winner set to be announced on Sept. 6.
Voters will go to the polls on June 2, 2024, to elect a new president, eight state governors, the next mayor of Mexico City and thousands of other federal, state and municipal representatives.
Mexico News Daily
