LatinNews Daily - 22 October 2010

Development: On 21 October, Roberto Gil, a federal deputy for the ruling Partido Acción Nacional (PAN), urged the lower chamber's Sección Instructora, the body in charge of determining whether public servants can be stripped of their privileges, to quickly come to a decision about the case of deputy Julio César Godoy, so that the chamber could vote on the issue.
 
Significance: Godoy is wanted by the Procudadurí­a General de la República (PGR) since 2009 for his suspected links to drug trafficking gangs. However, as a recently sworn-in federal deputy, he is immune from prosecution. It appears that the PAN, which is trying to forge an electoral alliance with Godoy's former party, the left-wing Partido de Revolución Democrática (PRD), in order to defeat the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI) in the upcoming July 2011 Estado de México elections, is adopting a strong stance against Godoy in order to avoid potentially damaging repercussions from the case.