Mexican Radio Host’s Resignation Highlights Ties Between Government and Media
The statement noted that the office of social communication
and the spokesman of the president valued the professional contributions of Mr. Curzio, Ms. Casar and Mr. Raphael, and welcomed their critical viewpoints in various media, including on a state-owned channel where they all continue to contribute.
While Ms. Casar emphasized that she could not prove there had been coercion or pressure from the federal government, she added
that "it does sound like censorship." "The whole issue has to do with the unbalanced relationship between power and the media in Mexico, where most media depends and lives off of official publicity," she said.
"It’s like being asked to get rid of a sports show during the World Cup." Mr. Curzio’s resignation has roiled Mexico’s media
and political class, and he and his co-hosts denounced the government’s influence over the media in the country in interviews this week.
The next day, Mr. Curzio was called before his radio station’s president, Edilberto Huesca, who demanded that Ms. Casar and Mr. Raphael be fired.
ial applause," said María Amparo Casar, a co-host of the show and a respected political scientist, taking aim at a battery of initiatives, including those proposed by the president’s party, the Institutional Revolutionary Party, which is expected to face a tough fight in next year’s presidential election.
that are absurd, populist and cheap, and they demonstrate their eagerness to gain an easy round of soc
"The federal government fully respects and values the freedom of expression
that characterizes Mexican democracy and, for that reason, does not intervene in any way in the labor relations or editorial policies of the media," according to a statement from the president’s office.