Two Mexican candidates for mayor are shot dead in Mexico just hours apart – marking SEVEN political murders in the country this year ahead of election in June
Two mayoral candidates have been shot dead in less than 24 hours in Mexico. This is the seventh political assassination in the run-up to the June general election.
Diego Pérez, who ran for office in the southern state of Chiapas, was found dead on Thursday.
His body showed signs of torture and was left next to his wife and son, both of whom were injured.
Pérez was the Institutional Revolutionary Party’s nominee for mayor of San Juan Cancuc.
“We strongly call on the authorities to clarify these facts and punish those responsible,” the Institutional Revolutionary Party said in a statement.
“The government cannot continue to deny the reality: more than 110 acts of violence linked to the electoral process require measures to be taken to ensure the safety of all and to prevent organized crime from being the one who chooses on June 2, and not good citizens.’
Tomás Morales, who aspired to become mayor of Chilapa, a municipality in the Pacific coast state of Guerrero, was executed Wednesday evening.
Diego Pérez, who ran for office in the southern state of Chiapas, was found dead on Thursday. His wife and son were injured
Tomás Morales was running for mayor of Chilapa, a municipality in the Pacific coast state of Guerrero, and was shot dead outside his home on Wednesday evening.
Authorities said the 40-year-old was approached by a gunman as he got out of his car and was shot in the head outside his home. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Morales served as a councilor in the neighboring city of José Joaquín de Herrera from 2009 to 2012.
His wife, Delia Solano, served as a councilor in Chilapa from 2018 to 2021.
He worked for a government social program and resigned in January to pursue his mayoral aspirations under President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s ruling Morena party, although the political bloc had not formally named him as an official candidate.
Alfredo González, a mayoral candidate in the town of Atoyac, Guerrero, was shot dead on March 2
Miguel Ángel Zavala, who was from the ruling Morena party President Andrés Manuel López Obradorwas shot dead on February 26.
National Action Party candidate Armando Pérez was found shot dead on February 27
Miguel Angel Zavala, from the Morena party, was found dead in Maravati, Mexico on February 26
Armando Pérez, from the conservative National Action Party, was assassinated on February 27. A third mayoral hopeful from that city was kidnapped and found dead in November.
Yair Romero, who was running for Congress for the Morena party in the sprawling Mexico City suburb of Ecatepec, was fatally shot in the street next to his brother on February 10. He is said to have received threats from a local union.
On January 5, David González, the local leader of the Institutional Revolutionary Party and candidate for mayor of Suchiate, Chiapas, was assassinated.
The same day, in the northwestern state of Colima, Sergio Hueso, a mayoral candidate of the Citizen Movement party in Armeria, was shot by gunmen while sitting in his vehicle.
Mexico’s drug cartels have often targeted mayors and mayoral candidates in assassination attempts in an effort to control local police or extort money from municipal governments.
Yair Romero hoped to join the Mexican Congress and was found shot dead next to his brother in the Mexico City suburb of Ecatepec on February 10.
David González, the local leader of the Institutional Revolutionary Party and candidate for mayor of Suchiate, Chiapas, was assassinated on January 5.
The watchdog group Civic Data said in a January report on political violence that “2023 was the most violent year in our database. And all indications are that 2024 will be even worse.”
Mayoral, state and federal elections are increasingly synchronized onto a single election day.
“It is likely that the biggest elections in history will also suffer the biggest attacks from organized crime,” Civic Data said.
Michoacán had the fifth highest number of attacks on politicians and government officials in 2023, after Guerrero and Guanajuato. Zacatecas and Veracruz also had a higher number of attacks.