Zedillo’s Rubber Stamp Runs Dry in Congress

They were known as levanta-dedos--”finger-raisers.” For decades, Mexico’s congressmen did little else, obediently lifting their hands to vote for whatever the president and leaders of his Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, wanted.

But last week, Congress stunned the government with an unprecedented thumbs-down. When President Ernesto Zedillo asked for routine permission to travel to Washington, Canada and Nicaragua, the upstart Congress just said no. Only the two-day U.S. trip was allowed.

“The ‘fast track’ to approve whatever the executive wants has ended,” declared opposition leader Porfirio Munoz Ledo.

The vote appeared to be a largely symbolic muscle-flexing, and few doubt that Zedillo will eventually be permitted to make the other two trips.

But it shows that, when it comes to foreign policy, Mexico’s president no longer can always get what he wants. Zedillo, who will meet with President Clinton today in Washington, is considered a staunch U.S. ally on such key issues as free trade and combating drug trafficking. But the Mexican leader now faces greater challenges than ever to his policy of close cooperation with the United States.

“President Zedillo . . . can’t assure the Americans anymore that anything he commits Mexico to, he will be able to deliver,” said Adolfo Aguilar Zinser, a political scientist and senator.

Zedillo still has a strong hand in Congress. His party controls the Senate, which has the sole power to approve treaties and ambassadorial appointments.

But, for the first time in seven decades, the PRI in July lost its majority in the lower house. Emboldened by their victories and disarray in the PRI, the four opposition parties have banded together to seize power in the chamber.

“This has an echo in the Senate. They don’t want to seem like a rubber stamp of the president, so they’re being more aggressive,” said Rafael Fernandez de Castro, a political scientist.

Last week, opposition senators demanded that the government explain Mexican newspaper reports that U.S. military planes and warships were allowed to pursue drug traffickers in Mexican waters. The government responded in a statement that the reports were wrong.

Senators have also protested that they weren’t informed about a treaty with Germany that would protect foreign investments here.

But Aguilar Zinser, a left-wing independent, predicted that ruling party senators might even challenge their president on relations with the U.S.

Some PRI senators, he said, are unhappy with Mexico’s shift to more pro-U.S. policies in recent years.

“Members of the PRI are ready to break discipline more on this issue than others,” said the senator.

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The first test of such discipline could come with a protocol to the existing U.S.-Mexico extradition treaty--regarded as one of the main achievements of Zedillo’s visit to Washington.

The protocol would allow temporary extradition of suspects facing criminal charges in both countries. The suspect would be tried first at home, then abroad, and serve the prison sentences back to back. Previously, the suspect had to complete his first sentence before the foreign trial even began.

Mexico’s foreign affairs secretary, Jose Angel Gurria Trevino, denied this week that there is opposition to the protocol. Senators “have been receptive,” he told a news conference.

“The executive branch has learned to lobby its own Congress and party,” said Fernandez de Castro. “It has to follow proper procedures, invest time, explain things.”