Mexico Presidential Favorite Eyes Border Tax Break Julian Cardona - Reuters
go to original April 2, 2012

Enrique Pena Nieto, presidential candidate for the opposition Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), gestures during a meeting with businessmen in Guadalajara March 30, 2012. (Reuters/Edgard Garrido)

CIUDAD JUAREZ  - The front-runner in Mexico's presidential election campaign said on Sunday he would create tax incentives to revive economic life along the U.S. border that has been depressed by drug violence.

"To strengthen the market and the export power of Ciudad Juarez, we need to provide emergency treatment through the tax system," Enrique Pena Nieto, favorite to win the July election, told supporters in this industrial city on the U.S. border.

Roughly 80 percent of Mexican exports are shipped over the northern border, including cars, electronics and other appliances assembled in Mexico from components that were shipped south from the United States and Canada.

The border cities are also a transfer point for illegal drugs heading for U.S. cities, a traffic that has become so violent it has hurt local economies.

A grinding effort by Mexico's outgoing President Felipe Calderon to curb drug traffickers has meant years of bloodshed in Ciudad Juarez and all candidates are promising economic growth and less violence.

Pena Nieto, the opposition Institutional Revolutionary Party's (PRI) candidate, is expected to outline more details of his security plans this week. The candidate did not explain details of his tax-incentive plan.

Most polls give Pena Nieto a double-digit lead over Calderon's National Action Party (PAN) rival Josefina Vazquez Mota.

Editing by Anthony Boadle

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