ANALYSIS: Arrests of mayors shake Mexico's political structures

Mexico City - Mexico's political structures have been shaken by a surprise raid against alleged 'narco-politicians,' which had led to the arrests of close to 30 mayors and officials in the western state of Michoacan by Wednesday. The arrests in the native state of Mexican President Felipe Calderon included representatives of the country's three major parties: Calderon's National Action Party (PAN), the leftist Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), and most of all the Revolutionary Institutional Party (PRI), which led Mexico for decades from 1929- 2000. The arrests came less than two months before the mid-term and regional elections set for July 5, in which 500 federal legislators and six governors are set to be chosen along with mayors and local legislators in 11 states. According to officials, 8,200 people have been killed since January 2008 as rivalling drug cartels have engaged in a violent conflict for control of the country's drug-trafficking routes. The risk that the drug gangs impose their preferred candidates is high, particularly at the municipal level, where contact between authorities and police with organized crime is very direct. Jose Vazquez, the mayor of the Michoacan town of Turicato who was murdered in November 2008, once said in comments that were republished in the daily Excelsior on Wednesday that drug cartels have to OK election candidates. Vazquez recalled how he put himself forward as a candidate and then had to go and see the drug boss Ramiro Castaneda, of the Millenium Cartel, for approval. Thereafter he suffered constant pressures to appoint officials to suit the gang's interests. 'If you don't do it, they kill you and that's that,' Vazquez said in 2007, a year before he was murdered by a group of armed men. 'All candidates have to suit them, whether they belong to the PRI, the PAN or the PRD. The drug gangs give their approval to candidates.' Tuesday's raid led within five hours to the arrests of 10 mayors, 17 officials and a judge. It was quick and unexpected, even for Michoacan Governor Leonel Godoy (of the PRD), who said he had not been informed by the federal government. Some of the arrested mayors were in their homes, other in the town hall and some launching public works when soldiers and police arrived to take them away, between 7 am and midday. Arrests continued with another mayor Wednesday, and they were expected to go further. No formal charges were immediately filed against any of the officials arrested, which include the coordinator of advisors to Michoacan's attorney general, an advisor who was once state minister for public security and the head of the State Institute of Police Training, who was also a former public security minister. According to the authorities, a six-month investigation gathered evidence that indicates the officials were part of a protection network for the drug cartel La Familia Michoacana. The group, a splinter organization from Los Zetas - which itself emerged as the armed wing of the Gulf Cartel before becoming independent - appeared on the map of Mexico's criminal organizations in 2006 with beheadings and murders. In a context of great political polarization, reactions did not take long. Leaders of the PRD and the PRI called upon the central government to handle the issue with care and avoid a politicization of the fight against drug trafficking. 'It would be a despicable thing and a contemptible action for someone to use the problem of public insecurity to draw an advantage in the electoral sphere,' said PRD chairman Jesus Ortega. Manlio Babio Beltrones, the leader of PRI senators, asked that the fight against organized crime not be used for political or party purposes.