Mexico’s ruling party has chosen former Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum as its candidate for the upcoming presidential election in 2024, positioning her as the front-runner to become Mexico’s first female president.
Claudia Sheinbaum, aged 61, is a close ally of President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador and had long been considered the leading contender in the selection process conducted by the leftist National Regeneration Movement (MORENA).
Sheinbaum emerged victorious among five other candidates, winning in all five nationwide polls that determined the outcome. She garnered an average of approximately 39% of the vote, according to the party’s announcement.
However, just before the official announcement, Sheinbaum’s primary rival, former foreign minister Marcelo Ebrard, raised concerns about irregularities in the voting process and called for a redo of the election.
Ebrard was notably absent when Sheinbaum was declared the winner, and he later stated in an interview with a Mexican radio station that he and his team had been removed from the event held at Mexico City’s World Trade Center.
Ebrard indicated that he would make a decision on his next steps on Monday and did not rule out the possibility of aligning with the center-left Citizens’ Movement (MC), the only major opposition party yet to nominate a presidential candidate. Ebrard secured just over a quarter of the vote in the MORENA polling.
His campaign had been raising concerns about the selection process for weeks, intensifying their complaints in recent days, and many political observers had anticipated a dispute.
Leaders of MORENA swiftly defended the election results, with Alfonso Durazo, the president of MORENA’s national board, stating, “There is no incident that has affected the final result in a definitive manner. The result of this process is definitive.”
All of MORENA’s state governors, including Durazo, expressed support for the integrity of the selection process.
Opinion polls indicate that MORENA is heavily favored to win the presidential election scheduled for June 2, although President Lopez Obrador has called for party unity in the lead-up to the election.
The primary opposition alliance has already nominated a female candidate, Xochitl Galvez, a charismatic senator of Indigenous origin with a compelling personal story of overcoming adversity to become a successful entrepreneur.
Claudia Sheinbaum, a respected physicist and environmentalist before her entry into politics, has pledged to uphold President Lopez Obrador’s legacy and align herself with his political base, which is a cornerstone of his consistently high approval ratings, hovering around 60%.
Sheinbaum, known for her consensus-building approach, has also expressed a commitment to increasing the use of renewable energy, a departure from the president’s focus on revitalizing the state oil company, Pemex.
