A few days ago, in the state of Veracruz, left wing politician Celestino Rivera Hernandez was caught in the act of sodomizing and raping a 12 year old boy that he had picked up on the street. Celestino is a “respected” pillar of his community, but he had done this before. No less than 5 [...]
His emblem is a headband dyed the red, green and white of Mexico’s flag and emblazoned with his one-word stage name, “Juanito.” From the working-class streets where he peddles used clothing and holiday decorations, he muses about running for president.
If anyone has spiced up the drab aftermath of Mexico’s July 5 legislative elections, it is Rafael Acosta, an exuberant hawker-turned-activist-turned-politician-turned-spoiler who may end up in charge of Mexico City’s most populous borough, which has more people than metropolitan Las Vegas.
For two months, Acosta has been the lead character in an odd political drama that has made Juanito a household name, while providing enough cautionary lessons to rival Aesop’s fables.
In the July elections, Acosta was elected chief of the teeming Iztapalapa borough, a kind of mayor in miniature, thanks to a maneuver orchestrated by Mexico’s main leftist figure, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.
Acosta was supposed to be only a bit player in Lopez Obrador’s plan, whose main purpose was to block the election of a candidate from a rival wing of the Democratic Revolution Party, or PRD, after a disputed nomination process in the fractious party.
Under the plan, Lopez Obrador urged his supporters in the PRD to vote for Acosta, an ally who ran as a candidate of the fringe Labor Party. The script then called for Acosta to step down, if elected.
According to the plan, Clara Brugada, a former congresswoman in Lopez Obrador’s faction, would be put forward as a replacement. Brugada had been disqualified as the PRD candidate less than a month before the election by a federal electoral tribunal that found “irregularities” in the party’s primary.
The strategy seemed to work. With Lopez Obrador’s backing, Acosta won easily in Iztapalapa, a PRD bastion. Acosta publicly promised to step down after winning.
But it wasn’t long before the plan went awry: Acosta started having second thoughts about leaving.
He blamed Brugada, saying she wouldn’t answer his condition that at least half the key borough jobs go to his backers. Lopez Obrador warned him not to fall prey to the “siren song” of power.
The Mexican press was there every time Acosta got to mulling whether he should keep the job for himself. The street vendor was suddenly a media sensation. He has assumed the role with gusto.
During a television interview last month, Acosta declared that he didn’t need Lopez Obrador or Brugada.
“I would have won with any party by running only as ‘Juanito,’ ” he said. (He adopted the nickname years ago after coaching a youth soccer team in which 11 players were named Juan.)
Acosta said he planned to run for mayor of Mexico City in 2012, and hinted at a possible run for president. “If the people elect me, why not?” he told one journalist.
The drama over whether Acosta would relent — and the spectacle of a scheme blowing up in the faces of its makers — has been delicious grist for pundits eager to find a moral to the story.
“Juanito is the little Frankenstein who disowned his creator,” commentator Raymundo Riva Palacio wrote.
Acosta is new to electoral politics but long a fixture at leftist protests, including those supporting the claim that the 2006 presidential election was stolen from Lopez Obrador. Acosta noted proudly during the recent campaign that he had appeared, stripped to his underwear, in a Mexican fichera movie, a once-popular genre full of scantily clad women.
If Acosta keeps the job of running Iztapalapa, a crowded place of 1.8 million, he would inherit some of the most difficult problems in Mexico City, including deep poverty, infrastructure in disrepair and frequent water shortages. But the budget is big, about $280 million this year, and the borough chief makes about $90,000 a year.
Acosta sounded resolute about retaining the job the other day. The swearing-in is Oct. 1.
“The people have spoken,” he said during a visit to pray at the famed Basilica of the Virgin of Guadalupe, with a battalion of news cameras in tow.
But then Thursday, Acosta stoked the intrigue by meeting with Brugada over lunch. He said the two ate well, but did not reach a deal.
Juanito, vendor-activist-politician-spoiler, also played master of suspense: He promised more news in a few days.
Source: Ken Ellingwood/LA Times
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/09/14/yemen.childbirth.death/index.html
A 12 year old Yemeni girl died from labor… as well has her child. She was wed to some 24 yr old man.
12 years… that is totally horrible. I try to be open to religions and cultures, but this is really too much. Noone can rape a 12 year old girl, get her pregnant and see her die trying to give birth. This guy needs to be put away. Any religion that supports this kind of behavior needs to be really redone from the bottom… any religion that thinks this is cool, is just a sect. They should be put in jail, all of them. Anyone that supports this religion should do some real introspection.
Apart from the man that raped her, her parents should be sent to jail for life. Who would allow something like that to happen???? To a loved son/daughter?
Mehdi Muhammed Ghezali (Arabic: محمد مهدي غزالي) (b. 1979 (age 29–30)), in media previously known as the Cuba-Swede (Swedish: Kubasvensken), is a Swedish citizen of Algerian and Finnish descent who was held as what the United States termed an unlawful combatant at the Guantanamo Bay detainment camp on Cuba between January 2002 and July 2004. Prior to his capture Ghezali attended a Muslim religious school and mosque in the United Kingdom before travelling to Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, and finally ended up in Pakistan where he was captured. Following his release from detention the Swedish government has not brought any further criminal charges against him for criminal misconduct prior to his capture.
A man bearing Ghezali’s passport was one of twelve foreigners Pakistani security officials reported were captured trying to cross into Afghanistan on August 28 2009. According to the Associated Press Ghezali was “reportedly part of a group of 156 suspected al-Qaida fighters caught while fleeing Afghanistan’s Tora Bora mountains.
So, the question goes… how many strikes do you get at being a presumed terrorist? In Guantanamo for a couple of years, released and – according to his parents – at some pilgrimage to Mecca. But no, he was back to the place where he was apprehended the first time around. Makes me think Swedes of Finnish and Algerian descent are pretty dumb.
@BestBuyMexico Tienen algun plan de abrir tienda en Cuernavaca? Segun Expansion en 2009, tenian el plan de abrir 11 nuevas tiendas en Mexico
Peña Nieto sale a caminar y ve un pájaro de color azul: "Mira! Un Twitter!" #soyprole #LibreriaPeñaNieto
#Telmex has taken so far 12 days to move a phone line and an Internet line within city limits. Only phone is working so far. Telmex SUCKS