Mexican President Warns Others May Leave Government After Urzua

(Bloomberg) -- Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, under pressure after the resignation of his finance minister, warned other officials may quit his government as part of the deep policy changes he is leading.

“In a democratic government there are always differences and disagreements,” Lopez Obrador said Wednesday at his daily press conference. “You have to get used to the changes and there could even be other resignations.”

The Mexican peso dropped as much as 0.8%, leading emerging markets currency losses for a second straight session. It fell 0.4% to 19.2344 per dollar at 9:01 a.m. in New York.

AMLO, as the Mexican leader is known, said the resignation of Carlos Urzua on Tuesday stems from disagreements over the country’s national development plan. Urzua also disagreed about the management of Mexico’s state-owned banks, the president said, adding that the former finance minister had clashed with his Chief of Staff Alfonso Romo and with the head of Mexico’s tax collection agency.

“This is a government of free men and women. Suddenly someone can say ‘I don’t agree with the government’s path’,” AMLO said, adding that no other resignation has been presented to him so far. “What I want to make clear is that the way of doing politics won’t change at all.”

To contact the reporters on this story: Carlos Manuel Rodriguez in Mexico City at carlosmr@bloomberg.net;Cyntia Barrera Diaz in Mexico City at cbarrerad@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Juan Pablo Spinetto at jspinetto@bloomberg.net, Walter Brandimarte

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