Mexico: Demian Bichir backs Lopez Obrador, saying he “can swim with sharks”
Good amigos: Demian Bichir says he will vote for presidential candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador because he is a politician that intends to govern for the benefit of all. (Twitter: @polimniaromana)
By MANUEL RUEDA
Channel: Latin American Affairs
Oscar nominee Demian Bichir backed Mexico’s leftist presidential candidate on Thursday night, after the two greeted each other in a Mexico City theater.
Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador “knows how to swim with sharks,” Bichir said with the presidential candidate at his side, “so (winning) the election should be toast,” the actor added, garnering some laughs from the surrounding group of theater fans and journalists.
Obrador caught up with Bichir backstage at Mexico City’s Insurgentes Theater, after attending a performance of Bichir’s latest play, which is appropriately called Swimming with Sharks.
The leftist Obrador, is currently trailing frontrunner Enrique Peña Nieto by 20 points in the polls, and in most of these opinon surveys, he also falls behind government candidate, Josefina Vazquez Mota.
However, Bichir said that he “had no reason to vote for either” Peña Nieto or Vazquez Mota, even if it was good for Mexico to have a female candidate.
Obrador narrowly lost the 2006 elections, with his opponents saying that he was a disciple of Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez. Some of his detractors in Mexico still fear that he will install socialist policies that will stall the country’s economy.
But in a recent interview with Univision’s Jorge Ramos, Bichir said the following in Obrador’s defense:
“I must say that for many years the people from the PRI and the PAN already had their chance. Lopez Obrador deserves an opportunity … Its important that people understand that Lopez Obrador intends to govern for (the benefit) of all, he is not a threat.”
