Andrés Manuel López Obrador, President of Mexico.
Photo: Sáshenksa Gutiérrez / EFE
From the National Palace, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador clarified that “there is no break” with Spain after declaring to “pause” relations with that European countrydue to the corruption that he has denounced about Spanish companies in Mexico in matters of energy, construction and tourism.
“What I said yesterday is “we are going for the good of our peoples, to have a break.” I didn’t talk about breaking up. No. I said “we are going to calm down the relationship”, that no longer be thinking that Mexico is going to be looted with impunity, that has already happened, it is disrespectful,” he said.
“It is not a rupture of relations and it is not against the Spanish people, it is nothing more than a respectful protest, fraternal, for the abuses and grievances committed against the people of Mexico and our country,” he specified.
The Mexican president again accused the “political power” of Spain of supporting companies that “abused Mexico”, including Iberdrola, Repsol and OHL.
“We have intimate relations with the people of Spain, but in recent times during the neoliberal period, Spanish companies supported by political power, both from Spain and Mexico, abused our country and of our people, they saw us as a land of conquest”, he assured.
“Only the analysis of how much those from Repsol de México took in the government of (Felipe) Calderón (former president of Mexico), only how much money from the public budget they obtained and took from Mexico, It would help to understand that it was an abuse, the OHL thing was the favorite company in the past six-year term, also Spanish, all the influencers in the management of tourism to the highest levels of power in Spain and Mexico”, he specified.
Andrés Manuel López Obrador considered that the Government of Spain should also apologize for the behavior of its companies and for “favoring” the Mexican public budget.
“They have offended us Mexicans because it is not only what high officials work with these companies, but what this type of relationship costs us, we are talking about subsidies, money from the budget that belongs to all Mexicans who, instead of used to lift the people out of poverty, it was used to favor these companies”, he commented.
“They should even apologize, they haven’t, it doesn’t matter, but we are going to enter a new stage slowly, and I repeat, it is not a rupture, it is nothing more than saying ‘this has happened’, and the people of Mexico must know it and the people of Spain”, he stressed.
The president also clarified that it is not about “phobia or xenophobia” towards the Spanish, but about respect and political management.
“It is not phobia or xenophobia, it is that we have to respect each other and the same in political managementI just remind you that now they are tearing their hair out because of what I said and the one who was the president of the Bancomer board, which now belongs to Spanish businessmen, who was president of the last campaign, spoke out against me saying that I was a populist, the president of the main Spanish bank in Mexico, even the main foreign bank that operates in Mexico, well, how did the owners of the country feel?
It was yesterday morning, Wednesday, February 9, that the president of Tabasco caused controversy by signaling “a pause” with Spain.
“A pause to respect us and not see us as a land of conquest. We want to have good relations with all the governments of the world, but we do not want them to rob us, just as the Spaniards do not want to be robbed from any country. And they do well. Well, we don’t want us either, ”López Obrador said yesterday at his morning conference.
These statements provoked the reaction of the Spanish foreign minister, José Manuel Albares, who asked Mexico for an explanation of what was said by the Mexican president.
“I am going to verify the scope of these statements that, I understand, they have been produced in an informal environment and do not respond to an official position, or an official statement… We would have to ask López Obrador what he meant,” said Albares.
“Relations between Mexico and Spain are a strategic association that goes beyond sudden verbal declarations or punctual words. The Government of Spain has not taken any action that could justify such a declaration”, the Spanish foreign minister pointed out yesterday Wednesday at the end of the joint meeting of the ministers of Foreign Affairs and Health of the European Union in Lyon, France.
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Source-laopinion.com