Films highlight Mexico's dark political past

[DD]

There are at least 3 films that have been released or are about to be released in the last few weeks before the presidential election that do not shed a good light on the PRI.  Probably a coincidence.

The film "Colosio" was released yesterday portrays the killing of Luis Donaldo Colosio, the PRI candidate for President who was assassinated in March of 1994.  Colosio was almost certain to be elected and has been compared to JFK both in his life and his death.  He seemed to be loved by the people, had a beautiful wife, and the govt. story was that he had been assassinated by a lone gunman that shot him in the right temple and the left abdomen.  

Although Colosio was the PRI candidate, and there was no other political party that had any power, the were different factions within PRI.  Colosio had promised to reform the  government system run by corruption and coercion.  Some elements of PRI didn't like that very much.  Even though Colosio had been handpicked by then President Carlos Sabinas, the most persistant rumor after the assassination   was  is that Colosio was shot on the orders of Salinas himself because of a speech Colosio gave, talking about the Mexican people "thirst" for justice and a bright future. According to this rumor Salinas felt those words marked a rupture between Colosio and him.

A few months later, Salinas' brother-in-law, José Francisco Ruiz Massieu, president of the PRI was also murdered in plain daylight in Mexico City, eliminating the two most visible and powerful official heads of the PRI in Mexico, Colosio and Ruiz Massieu.

The elder brother of former President Carlos Salinas de Gortari was arrested a few months later  on charges of having ordered the assassination of Massieu.  



How could all this happen when PRI was supposed to rule with such an iron hand.  My over simplified  explaination:

My  convoluted plot line revolves around the cozy links between Mexico's powerful drug cartels and the ruling government's corrupt "narcopoliticians": During the presidency of Harvard-educated Carlos Salinas de Gortari, drug lords enriched venal officials at the highest levels of government, in return for their protection of the underground drug economy; when reform-minded politicians, even though members of PRI, threatened to put an end to the graft, narcopols in the ruling party had them bumped off; finally, the inevitable coverups and denials began.

Pena Nieto is surely aware of the this history of PRI.  How truly independent do you think he will be as the "new face" of the party?

n the end, Colosio's slaying indirectly helped pave the way for the PRI's ouster. President Carlos Salinas de Gortari chose a technocratic Cabinet minister, Ernesto Zedillo, to replace Colosio as candidate. And it was Zedillo who as president did what was long unthinkable in the PRI. He quickly recognized the opposition had won the 2000 election, squashing any attempts to rig the results, and as a result, Vicente Fox of PAN was elected.

The other new feature film, "Machete Language," tells of a fictional couple that witness police brutality after a clash with flower vendors in 2006 in Mexico State, where Pena Nieto was governor.

The documentary, "Gimme the Power" by the band Molotov, describes the history of rock and roll in Mexico and government censorship of musicians who tried to sing about the country's ills.

The documentary stretches back to a rock and roll festival that drew some 200,000 fans to the shores of Mexico state's Lake Avandaro in 1971. The signal of the live radio broadcast of the concert was cut after the audience began shouting "We have the power! We have the power!" PRI-controlled governments largely banned rock concerts well into the 1980s.

I couldn't find and complete Youtubes of the movies, but you can watch some of the "trailer"  there.

Link to the story about the movies;
http://www.boston.com/ae/movies/articles/2012/06/14/films_highlight_mexicos_dark_political_past_1339703418/?page=2

[eternalcode]

molotov "gimme the power"



lyrics in spanish and english: http://lyricstranslate.com/en/gimme-power-gimme-power.html

[Chimera]

Thank you for this historic background info, ACI. I only am familiar in general terms with the past politics of Mexico and am just slowly learning all the names and connections. You are really helping me!