The Corruptour Bus Takes a Local Route to Fighting Mexican Corruption Paulina Villegas - New York Times
go to original January 12, 2015

The Corruptour bus, which visits sites linked to corruption in Monterrey, Mexico, is decorated with caricatures of politicians. (Rodrigo Cruz/The New York Times)

MONTERREY, Mexico — Inside a large, open-air bus, a corrupt politician quarrels over the loudspeakers with a fed-up citizen who tells the passengers about the millions of pesos lost in a series of corruption scandals.

As the scripted recording plays, three security guards sitting on a bench watch in awe at the passing bus before cracking up in laughter, pointing at the bright red and yellow insignia on its side: the “Corruptour.”

The broadside includes caricaturized faces of the state’s former and current governors. Both grin at passers-by, drawing stares at each of the 11 “corruption landmarks” that the bus tour aims to spotlight, including the casino where gunmen started a fire that killed 52 people.

“We have failed to place the issue of corruption at the center of political debate,” said Miguel Treviño, the head of the Corruptour project and founding member of Via Ciudadana, one of many local groups pushing to raise political and social awareness here in Mexico’s richest city.

“We need to make it tangible and understandable to people, and to explain its direct implications on our everyday lives so they will want to fight it,” he said.

Born through a mix of frustration, satire and savvy, the Corruptour is a free one-hour ride led by young activists hoping to stir a political awakening with five trips per weekend.

In this industrial city of 1.1 million people, the quirky bit of political tourism is the latest creative attempt to agitate for what Mexicans widely say they sorely need: a less corrupt, more efficient government.

Read the rest at The New York Times

Miguel Treviño, Via Ciudadana, Corruptour (Chinothocles)

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