Bloomberg Interviews ManattJones CEO on Institutional Revolutionary Party’s Evolution
“Pena Nieto Poised to Return Mexico’s Once-Lofty PRI to Power”
Bloomberg
June 28, 2012 – Bloomberg looked to ManattJones Chairman & CEO James R. Jones for insight into whether the corrupt governmental practices that transpired during the Institutional Revolutionary Party’s (PRI) 71-year reign of Mexico will affect its presidential candidate’s chances of being elected.
Bloomberg reports that Enrique Pena Nieto, a member of the PRI and Mexico’s presidential front-runner, has built his campaign on the promise that his party has evolved. His critics, however, suggest that Pena Nieto will revive the corruption that thrived under the PRI’s ruling of Mexico. The PRI fell from power in 2000, and Pena Nieto, who is leading his nearest rival by more than 10 percentage points, would be the party’s first presidential candidate to win an election since 1994.
Jones, who is a former U.S. Ambassador to Mexico, told Bloomberg that while some of the PRI’s older leaders may try to turn back time, the opening of Mexico’s economy over the past two decades has given rise to younger leaders like the 45-year-old Pena Nieto, making a return to authoritarian rule unlikely.
“It’s almost impossible for the PRI or anyone to turn back the clock,” said Jones. “The institutions of democracy have become so entrenched that I don’t see them changing.”
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