Mexico City [Mexico], May 31: A mayoral candidate in the Mexican state of Guerrero has been shot dead in the latest attack on an aspiring politician, ahead of this weekend's elections.
Alfredo Cabrera, who was running for mayor in the town of Coyuca de BenÃtez, was killed by a gunman at a campaign rally. The run-up to the vote, in which a new president as well as members of the legislature, nine governors and almost 20,000 local officials will be chosen, has been the most violent in recent history.
More than 20 candidates have been killed and hundreds more have been threatened.
Video footage shared by local media shows Alfredo Cabrera shaking hands with supporters ahead of his closing rally in Guerrero state. Someone can then be seen approaching him when, suddenly, shots ring out.
Some 15 shots can be heard. Guerrero state officials said that members of Mexico's National Guard returned fire, killing the gunman at the scene.
According to local media, Cabrera was under police protection after having been the target of a previous attack in 2023. An investigation has been launched to determine what the possible motive of the attack may have been. Government figures suggest 22 people running for local office have been murdered across Mexico since last September but non-governmental groups say the number is even higher.
Cabrera's murder was condemned by Xochitl Galvez, who is running for president for the centre-right opposition coalition.
Galvez said there were "no words to express the indignation I feel". She added that she had met Cabrera and found him to be "a generous and upstanding man".
Galvez, 61, is backed by a coalition of opposition parties whose aim it is to remove the governing Morena party from office. The current president, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, is limited by the constitution to a single six-year term but his Morena party has put forward the former mayor of Mexico City, Claudia Sheinbaum, as its candidate.
Source: Qatar Tribune