Jose Lopez Portillo (16 June 1920 – 17 February 2004) was President of Mexico from 1 December 1976 to 30 November 1982, succeeding Luis Echeverria and preceding Miguel de la Madrid. He was the last of the "nationalist" Mexican presidents, and his tenure was marked by widespread government corruption and nepotism.
Biography
Jose Lopez Portillo was born in Mexico City, Mexico on 16 June 1920, and was a professor of jurisprudence before serving as an adviser to President Luis Echeverria. Upon his own election, he struggled to stabilize the country's economy, which was helped by the discovery of vast new oil reserves and the current high oil prices. In consequence, petroleum earnings increased from $500 million in 1976 to $13 billion in 1981. This made Mexico overreliant on oil exports, as became clear after 1981 when the decline in oil prices plunged the country into a deep economic crisis, which was made worse by an increase in foreign public debt to $57 billion by 1982. Given the economic hardships suffered by many Mexicans, he sought to defuse tension through political reform. Relaxing the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party's iron grip on power, he guaranteed the opposition a quarter of the seats in the enlarged Chamber of Deputies. When he left office in 1982, many members of his administration would go on to be charged with corruption. Lopez died in Mexico City in 2004.