ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1995, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, December 24, 1995 TAG: 9512280001
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: B-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GEORGE W. GRAYSON
ON THE ANNIVERSARY Wednesday of the 1994 bungled peso devaluation, Mexico's center-right National Action Party (PAN) - long dismissed as the Avis of Mexican politics - toasted its bright prospects even as a dour President Ernesto Zedillo reflected on a tempestuous first year in office.
The most recent embarrassment focused on the attempt by the sister-in-law of Zedillo's predecessor, Carlos Salinas, to withdraw funds from secret, multimillion-dollar Swiss bank accounts. Although Zedillo's ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) was not linked to the aborted transaction, this incident reinforced the dismal image of the PRI as a party drowning in corruption.
The PRI has ruled the country for 66 years. But PAN leaders, buoyed by their party's stellar performance in mid-November state elections and the festering Salinas family tragicomedy, hope to race past the PRI in the 1997 parliamentary elections en route to capturing the presidency in 2000.
Last month, the "Panistas" roared to victory in four state capitals. These and other successes gave PAN stalwarts the mayorship of 13 of the top 20 cities.
Once merely a gadfly that pricked the PRI in the north, the Catholic-oriented, pro-business PAN now also enjoys a robust presence in Mexico City, Yucatan and the Pacific South. All told, it boasts 211 mayors, four governors, 110 members of the Chamber of Deputies, 25 senators and 240 state legislators. All told, 30.3 percent of the population lives in a PAN-dominated state or municipality.
Several factors have lofted the PAN's blue and white banner:
The middle-class party recruits bright, upright candidates, many of whom are businessmen allergic to the traditional politics of vote stealing and money stashing.
PAN leaders have downplayed their holier-than-thou attitude in favor of moderation and flexibility. They helped Salinas open the nation's long-cocooned economy, pass NAFTA, privatize hundreds of state firms and normalize relations with the Roman Catholic Church.
Mexico's mushrooming cities provide ripe opportunities for proselytizing by the middle-class, urban-focused PAN.
Salinas, now brooding in self-imposed exile, contributed mightily to the PAN's success. While using every artifice available to undercut the leftist Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD), the erstwhile chief executive recognized PAN gubernatorial victories in Baja California and Chihuahua and virtually handpicked a Panista to head Guanajuato state. Not only did Salinas crave PAN's support for legislative initiatives, he wished to show Washington his commitment to political pluralism to gain passage of the free-trade pact.
The PAN has benefited enormously from the wrenching economic woes - signaled by a 7 percent decline in the gross domestic product this year, amid 55 percent inflation - that Salinas bequeathed to the politically inept Zedillo.
The worst economic crisis in recent memory has prompted millions of Mexicans to punish the PRI for its hamfisted economic policies. Disarray within the PRD leaves the centrist PAN as the only viable, mainstream option for irate but cautious voters. To use a local expression, these men and women have "blood in their eyes" for Salinas and the political class that has displayed obscene greed, narcissism and venality.
Can the PAN wrest control of the legislature and the presidential palace from the PRI, where it has resided since 1929? Unless Zedillo, a brainy but uncharismatic economist, can turn the economy around, the PAN's fortunes will continue to rise.
For one thing, Zedillo is struggling to bring cohesion to his lackluster Cabinet. The possibility that the puny economic growth forecast for 1996 will be eroded by bank failures sharpens his headaches.
Moreover, investors remain nervous about stability in a nation beset by several strong, outspoken anti-Zedillo governors, guerrillas in southern Chiapas state, the El Barzon debtors' movement and narcotics traffickers.
While on the defensive, the PRI still commands a potent electoral machine, particularly in rural areas, capable of winning elections. It still holds the presidency, 27 governorships, the Mexico City mayor's office, clear majorities in both houses of Congress, the lion's share of state legislatures and a lock on the 5-million-member Confederation of Mexican Workers.
To his credit, Zedillo is a straight arrow who looks good compared to the Salinas clan. He has pushed through an impressive social-security reform, restructured the country's debt and stabilized the mercurial peso.
Yet, a growing number of Mexicans have given up on the PRI. The Panistas can't take over the upper house in 1997, but they can garner at least a plurality in the 500-member Chamber of Deputies. Such a showing would enhance the presidential prospects of Guanajuato Gov. Vicente Fox and other party luminaries.
Ironically, sharply deteriorating conditions might convince Mexico's remarkably conservative electorate to grudgingly stick with a known quantity, the PRI, rather than opt for change. Unless sustained growth returns or pandemonium erupts to prompt voters to string along with the PRI, however, the PAN could emerge as numero uno by the end of the decade.
George W. Grayson, who teaches government at the College of William & Mary, is author of "The North American Free Trade Agreement: Regional Community and the New World Order."
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