Old Politics Ends New Journalism

The Mexican term “autogol” is borrowed from soccer and means the goal a player scores for his opponent. It is also used to describe actions that hurt one’s own cause. Unfortunately for Mexican President Vicente Fox, the recent firing of Francisco Ortiz Pinchetti as director of Notimex, the government-funded news agency, was a political “autogol.”

Notimex is Latin America’s largest news agency, with some 800 clients and 740 employees, including more than 100 in Mexico and another 100 abroad. For years, it was the propaganda vehicle of the government, that is, the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or the PRI, and the president.

Fox promised to transform Notimex into an independent and respected source of news, and Ortiz Pinchetti seemed the perfect candidate to orchestrate the change. In the mid-1970s, he was a reporter for Excelsior, then Mexico’s best daily newspaper and the most critical of government conduct. President Luis Echeverria, upset at the paper’s tone, engineered the ouster of its editor, Julio Scherer, in 1976.

It was a pivotal moment in the development of independent journalism in Mexico. Three hundred journalists, including Ortiz Pinchetti and staff, followed Scherer out the door. Together, they formed Proceso, a left-wing newsweekly, that for years was the only voice critical of the government in the Mexican mass media.

During his 25 years at Proceso, Ortiz Pinchetti covered some of the most important moments on Mexico’s road to democracy. These included widespread vote fraud in the state gubernatorial elections in Chihuahua in 1986 and the similarly fraudulent presidential election of 1988. He and his son, Francisco Ortiz Pardo, were the magazine’s correspondents on the Fox campaign during 2000.

Their reporting soon reflected the groundswell of Fox support that eventually led to his victory. But Proceso was distinctly anti-Fox, and Scherer’s son advised the PRI’s presidential candidate, Francisco Labastida. Less than a month before the presidential election, both Ortizes were fired. Neither Scherer nor Rafael Rodriguez Castaneda, the magazine’s editor, has given a reason for the firing. The episode stained the reputation of Scherer, who up to then was considered Mexico’s leading proponent of press freedom.

Ortiz Pinchetti accepted the Notimex job on the condition that he would have full autonomy to shape the news agency into a BBC- or Agence France Presse-style press. For a while, it seemed possible. The $4.5-million debt that Ortiz Pinchetti inherited was retired last month.

Above all, Notimex stories began appearing more frequently in the Mexican press. In part, this was because they reflected Mexico’s new pluralism. Notimex reporters could quote sources from across the political spectrum. Ortiz Pinchetti invited politicians from various parties to contribute opinion columns. “We had no more censorship. There were no more taboos or issues that weren’t touched,” he says.

But by the end of last summer, there were rumblings of discontent in the Interior Ministry, which oversees Notimex and its budget. Interior Undersecretary Jose Luis Duran complained to Ortiz Pinchetti that the governors of Queretaro and Oaxaca--one a member of the PRI, the other of Fox’s center-right National Action Party, or PAN--had objected to Notimex quoting their critics in news stories. Ortiz Pinchetti claims Duran insisted he fire the reporters in question, which he refused to do. Duran later complained about an article critical of Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda. Ortiz Pinchetti said he told Duran that it was an opinion column, identified as such and thus appropriate.

By this time, midway through his first year as president, Fox and his administration were getting hammered by Mexico’s media. Fox was also trying to cultivate support among Mexico’s governors. The combination of the two may have changed the administration’s attitude toward the idea of an independent news agency supported by the government. In any case, at a meeting in early November, Ortiz Pinchetti said Duran warned him that there were people in the administration who thought Notimex needed new management.

Later that month, Ortiz Pinchetti and 16 other top editors were fired. A spokesman for Duran said the firing was not censorship but a restructuring. Duran did not return repeated phone calls requesting comment on the firing.

“They said it was a decision aimed at the administrative side, but they fired only journalists and left the administrator in place,” Ortiz Pinchetti says. In protest, 25 reporters and editors quit. Notimex is now headless, its editorial staff demoralized. Pedro Tames, a former Duran assistant, is now interim director of the agency.

Javier Corral, a senator from Fox’s party, the PAN, called the firing “political censorship.” The Fox administration “thought twice about an agency producing real journalism,” Corral says.

Whatever the reason for the firing, it’s hard not to note its parallel with what happened at Excelsior years ago under PRI rule.

A revitalized Notimex could have been one shining example of what the Mexican president hopes to create in Mexico. Instead, he has lost some credibility and has another dysfunctional government agency on his hands. Ortiz Pinchetti’s fate may also illustrate how difficult it is to resist old tools of political control when change takes an unexpected course. The democratic traditions and habits--like speaking truth to power--that would have protected Ortiz Pinchetti are only now developing in Mexico. Notimex, if left alone, could have accelerated progress.

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Sam Quinones is the author of “True Tales From Mexico: The Lunch Mob, the Popsicle Kings, Chalino and the Bronx.”