Mexico City’s Mayor Charged; Rivals Pay Bail

Federal prosecutors Wednesday charged Mexico City Mayor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador with abusing his authority, a move that could land the leading presidential contender in court, block him from the 2006 ballot and fuel a political crisis here.

As was widely expected, the attorney general’s office filed the felony charges against Lopez Obrador over his alleged role in a minor land dispute.

Two members of a rival political party on Wednesday paid Lopez Obrador’s bail, a move political experts believed was aimed at suppressing public sympathy for his plight by keeping him out of jail.

One of the legislators who posted the $180 bail is the niece of Santiago Creel, Mexico’s interior minister and the presumed 2006 presidential candidate from President Vicente Fox’s National Action Party, or PAN.

Lopez Obrador, who has been traveling to various Mexican states to drum up support, denounced the PAN legislators as “swindlers.” Obrador had vowed to refuse bail if arrested and to campaign for the presidency from jail. Under Mexican law, experts said, third-party bail payments are permitted.

“They don’t want my name to appear in the electoral ballot,” Lopez Obrador said in front of a crowd in his home state of Tabasco on Wednesday.

A judge is expected to decide within the next 10 days whether to dismiss the charges or to allow the case to go to trial.

Wednesday’s developments were the latest chapter in a months-long political drama that could derail Lopez Obrador’s 2006 presidential aspirations. Mexican law prohibits anyone facing criminal charges from running for public office. The mayor is accused of ignoring a 2001 court order to halt construction of a municipal road over a parcel of expropriated land.

Members of PAN and the Institutional Revolutionary Party, PRI, have defended the prosecution on the grounds that no one is above the law, including the powerful mayor of the Western Hemisphere’s largest city. Representatives from the two parties, which form a majority in Congress, voted two weeks ago to strip Lopez Obrador of his immunity, clearing the way for the filing of charges.

But many Mexicans see it as a maneuver by rivals to snuff the presidential hopes of Lopez Obrador. The feisty populist and member of the Party of the Democratic Revolution is leading in presidential polls. Political veterans here have called the legal action against Lopez Obrador a dangerous setback to the nation’s fledgling democracy. The affair also has rattled financial markets.

On Friday, the attorney general’s office said it might delay filing charges for weeks or possibly months, pending the Supreme Court’s ruling on whether Congress preempted the Mexico City assembly’s prerogative to strip the mayor of his legal immunity.

Denise Dresser, a political scientist, said she believed that the attorney general stepped up his timetable because Lopez Obrador -- who took an informal leave from his office after his impeachment by Congress -- had promised to return to his mayoral duties Monday in defiance of his political opponents.

Dresser said Wednesday’s developments were further evidence of the legal confusion surrounding the case.

“Because there’s no precedent, and because this is so political, no one really knows how to proceed and they’re making it up as they go along,” Dresser said.

Manuel Camacho Solis, a former Mexico City mayor, said in an interview Tuesday that Lopez Obrador would continue to promote a political strategy of nonviolence among his supporters, while fighting the legal charges against him.

“We have to maintain [our relations] with the society, with the international and national media, and not fall into the temptation of letting people get too angry, of becoming radical,” Camacho said. “Lopez Obrador has a lot of prestige among his followers, so up till now he has been able to control it.”

But some analysts said the formal filing of charges could escalate tensions between Lopez Obrador’s followers and his political opponents.

“There’s going to be more indignation, more agitation and eventually confrontation,” said Jose Antonio Crespo, a political science professor at the Center for Economic Research and Teaching in Mexico City.

Lopez Obrador’s supporters are planning a mass demonstration in Mexico City on Sunday.

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Narayani Lasala in The Times’ Mexico City Bureau contributed to this report.