LEFT-OF-CENTER CONVERGENCIA PARTY STRUGGLING TO

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 02 MEXICO 003670

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/21/2017
TAGS: PGOV PREL PINR MX
SUBJECT: LEFT-OF-CENTER CONVERGENCIA PARTY STRUGGLING TO
MAINTAIN FOOTING

REF: MEXICO 3594

Classified By: POLCOUNS CHARLES BARCLAY, REASONS 1.4 (B) AND (D)



1. (SBU) Summary: With legislative elections next summer
that could determine its fate as a political party, Mexico's
small left-of-center Convergencia is casting around for
strategies that will help maintain its viability. On December
10, the party cemented a new alliance with the small,
far-left Labor Party (PT) to compete jointly in the
elections. Party members have also said their organization
seeks to capture disaffected PRD members to shore up its
base. However, many doubt either of these moves will
significantly improve the party's electoral fortunes. End
Summary.


2. (C) With neither a stand-out agenda to distinquish
itself from the larger parties, nor a robust national base,
Convergencia has been politically anemic since its founding
nearly ten years ago. Leaders of the ten year old party
describe themselves as "European-style" social democrats and
say their party's membership is drawn from Mexico's
professional elite, particularly from among younger
progressive Mexicans. However, like other small parties,
Convergencia's ideology is diffuse and difficult to pin down,
and while it has attracted some younger activists in urban
areas, it remains largely nested in the state of Veracruz,
where its current President, Dante Delgado, served a
controversial term as PRI governor in the late 1980s.


3. (C) Convergencia's move to join forces with the PT, an
organization that describes itself the last remaining
Marxist-Leninist party in Mexico, is characteristically
opportunistic, say Mexico's more cynical observers. These
describe the party as a money making machine designed to
maintain enough popular support and a legislative presence to
ensure its leaders access to public funding, as well as a
platform for cantankerous politicians who have alienated
their former parties (such as PRI, in Delgado's case). This
year, ideology is clearly secondary to the struggle to stay
afloat.


4. (SBU) The party has registered some short-term gains, and
its leaders in recent weeks have reached out to us to explain
themselves and outline their hopes for the future. At its
December 5 celebration, Poloff was accorded a place of honor
at one of the head tables and told of the lofty ambitions
party members harbor. The fete was held a few weeks after
Covergencia and PT broke relations with the PRD. Media had
also recently reported that an estimated 10,000 rank and file
PRD members had defected and signed up with Convergencia.


5. (C) Adan Perez, the party's elections coordinator,
confidently predicted to Poloff that his organization would
emerge from the 2009 elections as Mexico's third most
powerful political force. Alejandro Chanona, Convergencia's
legislative coordinator, made a similar boast in a meeting
with another Poloff earlier in the week.


6. (SBU) In reality, many observers here believe the party
will have trouble capturing the two percent of the vote it
needs to retain its registration as a political party.
Recent polls show its support at about one percent.


7. (SBU) The party pulled 2.3 percent of the vote in 2003
legislative elections, but its best showing was in 2006, when
it allied with PRD. Through horse-trading that is now
prohibited by the 2007 electoral reform law, it garnered 17
seats in the Chamber of Deputies and two in the Senate. The
new electoral law, however, stipulates that each party's
representation in congress will be strictly based on the vote
it captures, curtailing the ability of coalitions to decide
the distribution of seats among members.


8. (SBU) Other changes codified by the 2007 law will also
make it harder for Convergencia (and most small parties) to
maintain footing. Distribution of 70 percent of public
campaign advertising time now required to be set aside by the
major broadcasters will be based on each party's
representation in congress, giving a significant advantage to
the three big parties. In addition, each party in a

MEXICO 00003670 002 OF 002


coalition must appear on the ballot under its own logo,
rather than the coalition logo, which gives further advantage
to the larger, already well-branded parties.


9. (C) These changes -- and the support most PRD legislators
gave to the reforms -- engendered much bitterness on the part
of the small leftist parties. Alejandro Chanona told Poloff
that his party had decided months ago that it wasn't in its
interest to remain on the same ticket with PRD for the 2009
legislative elections. In addition to the alliance with PT,
he said, Convergencia hopes to recruit popular non-party
local leaders as candidates, work with disaffected PRD
members and encourage failed PRD presidential candidate
Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to campaign for Convergencia
candidates in constituencies where PRD was weak. The
hard-line PRD standard bearer has already expressed
willingness to go to bat for the small coalition.


10. (C) Comment: None of these strategies may work. Even
with their resources and fortunes married, Convergencia and
PT, with their small cadres of activists, will be hard
pressed to expand their national base. Lopez Obrador
provides some value-added, but his popularity is waning.
While he may be eyeing one of the smaller leftist parties
should he choose to leave the PRD, he will be putting most of
his energy into getting his hard-line supporters elected on
the PRD ticket. Some observers say the three mainstream
parties knew exactly what they were doing in changing
Mexico's electoral regime last year: ridding Mexico's
partisan landscape of the clutter of smaller parties.
Despite their best efforts, Convergencia and PT may fall
victim next July. End Comment.

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