Parties spent $322.8 million on caps, bags and shirts in six months

Nestor Jimenez

The newspaper La Jornada
Monday, August 26, 2024, p. 12

Between partial and opaque contracts, national political parties reported expenses totaling 322 million 872 thousand 298.7 pesos in the first six months of the year, only for caps, t-shirts, eco-bags, aprons, bracelets and flags.

The figure could be exponentially higher, since the National Action Party (PAN) reported only seven contracts of this type, while the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and Morena have not made their contracts transparent.

Throughout this year, national political parties will receive a total of 7,073.1 million pesos for their ordinary expenses, specific activities, postal and telegraphic franchise, according to the annual federal financing report issued by the National Electoral Institute (INE).

These prerogatives, which come from public resources, do not include the 3,304.8 million pesos that the parties have already spent on federal campaigns, and for which this additional allocation was established.

For 2025, the Commission on Prerogatives and Political Parties of the electoral body is planning a considerable increase. It is planned to distribute a fund of 7,354.2 million pesos for ordinary activities, which would be allocated to six parties, if the loss of registration of the Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) is ratified.

Meanwhile, within the contracts signed by parties in the first half of the year, including those of the Sol Azteca, the number of reports from one political force to another about the material they have acquired contrasts.

There are 169 contracts for this type of items available on the National Transparency Platform, which detail requests for T-shirts with the logos or colors of the parties, prints or phrases alluding to these political forces.

Movimiento Ciudadano presents the largest number of contracts, with 55 in the two quarters and expenses of 76 million 884 thousand 791.12 pesos, only for t-shirts, caps and vests. It also includes more than a dozen contracts for utilitarianin which suppliers are asked for items such as aprons, stickers and umbrellas.

The party with the highest amounts in contracts for this type of articles is the Green Ecologist Party of Mexico (PVEM), which allocated 175 million 968 thousand 186.17 pesos. It is followed by the PRD, with 39 million 279 thousand 246.09, and the Labor Party (PT) with 30 million 375 thousand 479.43 invested in utilitarian material.

For its part, the PAN reports seven contracts for 364,596.97 pesos. Morena and the PRI have not disclosed any contracts for utilities or other types of services so far.

This type of spending is characteristic of political forces even outside of presidential elections. Three years ago, for example, the PVEM spent almost half of its annual income just on purchasing backpacks, the advertising strategy that this party has used the most for the past decade.