Mexico deflated by Bush’s visit

Mexico deflated by Bush’s visit
By Adam Thomson in Mexico City
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007
Published: March 13 2007 21:18 | Last updated: March 13 2007 21:18


On Monday evening, George W. Bush stepped on to Mexican soil at the beginning of a two-day visit to the US’s southern neighbour and greeted each member of the welcoming committee with a: “Hi. How are you?”

If their replies had reflected the views of most Mexicans, they would almost certainly have responded: “Not very well.” There is growing frustration south of the border about the lack of progress on US-Mexican relations since Mr Bush took office at the beginning of 2001. A recent poll conducted by the BBC showed that most Mexicans consider US influence in the world to be negative.

Political analysts say that the objective of Mr Bush’s trip to Latin America was to curry favour with the growing Latin community in the US and to look for a possible counterweight to the in-creasing regional influence of Hugo Chávez, Venezuela’s leftwing president.

But little concrete progress can be expected from the visit, argues Jorge Zepeda, a political analyst in Mexico City. “He thinks a quick trip can make up for years of neglect but it can’t because he is not offering anything.”

One area in which Felipe Calderón, Mexico’s centre-right president who came to power in December, is desperate to make progress is immigration. Every year, an estimated 1m Mexicans head north in search of better-paid jobs. Of those, about 400,000 manage to cross illegally into the US.

Mr Calderón wants the US to approve a comprehensive immigration bill that would allow Mexicans to work temporarily in the US while also legalising the status of millions of Mexicans who live there without permission.

Mr Bush is sympathetic to such a plan, but political analysts say that any hope of him swaying US legislators on the immigration debate all but vanished last year when his party lost control of Congress.

Another area in which Mr Calderón would like to see greater US assistance is in the fight against drugs. Since taking office in December, Mr Calderón has launched a large-scale offensive against the country’s drugs cartels in an effort to “win back territory from organised crime”.

In a recent interview with the Financial Times, the Mexican president admitted that Mexico lacked the resources to tackle the problem effectively. “We cannot confront this problem alone,” he said. “We will need help.”

One high-level diplomat told the FT last week that a natural starting point in that help would be greater US commitment to combat the illegal flow of arms and chemicals used to move drugs into Mexico from the north.

On Tuesday, there was some limited hope that Mr Bush might use a press conference scheduled for Wednesday morning to announce a joint plan to combat drugs. Yet most agree that any plan is likely to lack significant funds to make much of a difference.

If Washington thinks that offers on the two issues will prove sufficient to persuade Mr Calderón to take on the role of trying to contain Mr Chávez in the region, it is likely to be severely disappointed.

Mr Calderón, indeed, ruled out any such idea in a recent interview. I am not interested in playing a role with Bush in that respect,” he said.

The result, argues Mr Zepeda, is almost certain to underline the disappointment that has marked the bilateral relationship ever since the high hopes that surrounded his first trip when he visited Vicente Fox, the former president, in 2001 on his ranch in the state of Guanajuato.

“Bush started his presidency playing cowboys with Fox on his ranch and he is ending it playing Indians in some Mayan ruins,” he says. “What has been achieved in the interim? Absolutely nothing.”