TIJUANA (Border Report) — Tijuana Mayor Montserrat Caballero has been praised for her ‘guts’ and ‘standing up against drug cartels’ but worries her remarks were reckless and just put bullseye on her back Some people
Caballero has held several press conferences Friday night since the cartel promised to make a ruckus in Tijuana and other cities in Northern Baja California.
In an encounter with the media, Caballero suggested that organized crime groups settle their debts with “those who owe them, not their families or citizens.”
But Mario Delgado Carrillo, chairman of the executive committee of the Morena party, to which Caballero and Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador belong, called the mayor’s comments “unfortunate and belligerent”. is.
“You can’t tell them to ‘collect from those who owe you,'” he said. “The most important thing is not to encourage further acts of violence, but to coordinate efforts within the government to prevent this from happening again.”
Mexico’s interior secretary, Adan Augusto López Hernández, denounced Caballero’s comments as “nerves getting the best of her”.
“I don’t attach much importance to it,” he said. “Let’s understand the time and circumstances of the press conference (early Saturday morning).
Since his initial meeting with the media, Caballero has continued with other comments that have been deemed inflammatory. , citizens of Tijuana.
She also tried to justify her statement by saying, “People along the border speak boldly and wildly.”
However, on social media, most of the reactions to her remarks were highly critical.
As a woman named Liz said, “It’s better to say nothing than to speak out in an attempt to justify your lack of communication skills.”
A man named Konrad Acevedo tweeted.
Miguel Cataro wrote, “She wants to solve the problem by leaving crime alone, as long as it remains among criminals.”
And Mexicali’s Rafa tweeted.
A civic group calling itself Mobimiento Ciudadano de Baja California has demanded an apology from Caballero.
We are sending a statement to news outlets across the state, “demanding that the mayor publicly apologize for the offensive remarks made to the public, or we will have the state legislature initiate proceedings against her to remove her.” I ask you to do so,” he said.
On Tuesday, Caballero appeared on national radio to “clarify” her comments on Joaquin Lopez Driga’s Mexico City-based Radio Formula show.
“I want to fix the problem, but I never intended to normalize criminal activity in Tijuana … The message of the night from organized crime is that citizens stay inside, and that criminals do what we do. I’m not going to dictate what you can do, we’re not going to, please forgive me, all I meant to say was that I don’t allow you to touch the residents of Tijuana.
.