Mexico City, Aug 21 (EFE).- Mexican President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Tuesday announced the names of his closest collaborators when he takes office Dec. 1.
The most prominent name on the list is that of former Michoacan state Gov. Lazaro Cardenas Batel, the grandson of President Lazaro Cardenas, who nationalized Mexico’s oil industry in the late 1930s.
Cardenas Batel will coordinate and oversee the work of all presidential advisers, Lopez Obrador told a press conference at his transition office in Mexico City, where a portrait of President Lazaro Cardenas hung on the wall behind him.
The former governor’s father, Cuauhtemoc Cardenas, ran for president three times and many think that he was cheated of victory in the 1988 election.
The president-elect also confirmed Alfonso Romo as his chief of staff.
Romo – a businessman and agro-industrialist, owner of Vector, the largest fund management company in Latin America – will act as a liaison between the government and Mexican and international investors and industrialists He will also be tasked with assessing various “strategic projects” during Lopez Obrador’s tenure.
Lopez Obrador made a point of repeating that his administration will “conduct the public life of the country” from the National Palace.
During the election campaign, he promised to turn the official presidential residence, Los Pinos, into a cultural center.