Spokesman denies Cardinal Rivera offered to mediate election dispute

Mexico City, Mexico, Jul 27, 2006 / 22:00 pm

The spokesman for the Archdiocese of Mexico city, Father Hugo Valdemar, issued a clarification on Thursday denying reports that Cardinal Norberto Rivera Carrera had offered to mediate the dispute surrounding the results of the July 2nd presidential elections.

“The Church has no intention of supplanting any institution,” Father Valdemar explained, referring, in this case, to the Electoral Tribunal of the Federal Judiciary.  “Rather, she desires or asks that we let the institutions act, because at this time to speak of mediation is to say that the Electoral Tribunal isn’t doing anything,” he said.

Father Valdemar noted that there are many individuals or even political parties in Mexico capable of providing mediation. Only in an extreme case when, “these options and possibilities of dialogue have been exhausted would the Church undoubtedly be open to mediating”

He also denied that the Mexican government is pressuring the Church to support Felipe Calderon as the winner of the elections, as militants of the leftist Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) and its candidate Andres Lopez Obrador have alleged.

“That accusation has no basis. The government has been deeply respectful of the Church as the Church has been to the federal government, that is to say, up to now, at least the Archdiocese of Mexico City has not been pressured to support any particular political issue,” Father Valdemar stated.