Mexican cartel violence and the killing of El Mencho 

In just a few months, Bafana Bafana will walk onto the pitch at Estadio Azteca in Mexico City to play Mexico in the opening match of the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

It will be South Africa’s first World Cup appearance since hosting in 2010, when Hugo Broos’s squad qualified after a 16-year drought, and the draw handed them the most poetic possible fixture: a rematch of the tournament opener from the last time these two countries met on football’s biggest stage.

Then, on Sunday, the country where that match is supposed to happen descended into chaos.

The man who ordered Sunday’s raid had his own score to settle. In 2020, dozens of The Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) members surrounded Security Secretary Omar Garcia Harfuch’s convoy in Mexico City. They opened fire with high-powered weapons, killing two bodyguards and a bystander. Harfuch took three bullets but miraculously survived. 

Harfuch knew exactly who ordered the 2020 hit: Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes, the dual U.S.-Mexican citizen whose cartel moved an estimated third of all drugs entering the United States by air and sea. The attack earned Harfuch a nickname: Mexico’s Batman. 

Five years later, on February 22, Harfuch’s forces tracked El Mencho through a romantic partner to a mountain hideout in Tapalpa, Jalisco. Defense Minister Ricardo Trevilla confirmed the details on Monday. El Mencho was wounded in the firefight and died while being airlifted to Mexico City.

Within hours, El Mencho’s cartel turned western Mexico into a furnace.

At least 73 dead and counting

Harfuch confirmed Monday that at least 73 people died in the operation and its aftermath of Mexican cartel violence. Twenty-five National Guard members were killed across six separate retaliatory attacks in Jalisco. Around 30 suspected cartel members died in Jalisco and four more in Michoacan. A prison guard, a state prosecutor’s agent, and a civilian woman were also among the dead.

More than 250 roadblocks choked 20 Mexican states. In Guanajuato alone, over 70 attacks hit 23 municipalities. Cars burned across highways. Gas stations were torched. Schools were canceled Monday across several states. 

Over 1,000 people spent Sunday night trapped in Guadalajara’s zoo, sleeping in buses while police trucks guarded the perimeter. Mothers carried toddlers out at dawn looking for bathrooms.

Puerto Vallarta, one of the continent’s most popular beach destinations, suspended all taxis and rideshares. Airlines including United, Delta, Southwest, Alaska, and Air Canada canceled flights into Puerto Vallarta and Guadalajara. 

The US Embassy issued shelter-in-place orders covering Puerto Vallarta, Guadalajara, Cancun, Playa del Carmen, Tulum, and cities across more than a dozen states.

The World Cup problem

This is the same Guadalajara scheduled to host four World Cup matches in June. Spain, Colombia, Uruguay, Mexico, and South Korea are all set to play there. Liga MX postponed four professional football fixtures on Sunday, including the Chivas vs America women’s clasico. Mexico’s friendly against Iceland, scheduled for Wednesday in Queretaro, was also scrapped.

FIFA has broad powers to relocate matches if security conditions warrant it. A Jalisco governor’s spokesman told The Athletic they had received no communication from FIFA “that should concern us.” Reassuring, lest we get ahead of ourselves.

Indeed, for anyone who remembers the fearmongering before the 2010 World Cup, the parallel is familiar. Back then, the world predicted South Africa would collapse into crime-fuelled anarchy during the tournament. It didn’t. Mzansi pulled it off brilliantly.

But. Mexico faces the opposite problem. Mexican cartel violence isn’t hypothetical. It’s happening mere months from kickoff. The CJNG boasts an estimated 19,000 members operating across 21 of Mexico’s 32 states. 

The cartel pioneered the use of explosive drones against military targets and, of course, there’s that spectacular assassination attempt with grenades and rifles that gave rise to Mexico’s Batman.

South African travelers, take note

Mexico has been growing as a destination for South Africans, particularly Cancun, Tulum, and Puerto Vallarta. South Africans still need a visa to visit Mexico, which limits casual tourism, but those with US or Schengen visas often add Mexico to their itineraries. 

If you’re among them, watch the travel advisories closely. Canada’s foreign affairs ministry called the situation “serious and rapidly evolving.” The US Embassy expanded its shelter-in-place advisory on Monday to cover personnel in eight cities and the state of Michoacan.

By Monday morning, cars were circulating again in Guadalajara. Mexico’s security cabinet said all 252 blockades had been cleared. But Lufthansa was the exception among European airlines, flying into Mexico from Frankfurt and Munich while most carriers remained cautious.

The succession problem

The US provided intelligence support for Sunday’s raid. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed Washington’s role and praised Mexico’s military. US Ambassador Ron Johnson declared that “bilateral cooperation has reached unprecedented levels.”

US Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau called El Mencho “one of the bloodiest and most ruthless drug kingpins” and urged everyone not to “lose our nerve.”

One point to note is that there is no obvious successor to El Mencho. His brother, son, and daughter are all in US prisons. There is El Mencho’s stepson, Juan Carlos Gonzalez Valencia, and a potential heir. But the more likely scenario is a bloody power struggle among regional bosses, while rival cartels probe CJNG territory for weakness.

David Mora of the International Crisis Group put it plainly. Other criminal groups now see “that the cartel is weakened and want to seize the opportunity.” When El Chapo was captured, it triggered a civil war within the Sinaloa Cartel and Mexican cartel violence that killed thousands.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum had herself criticised this “kingpin strategy” before taking office. She argued that hobbling cartels causes the exact chaos Mexico experienced on Sunday.

And yet, under relentless US pressure to show results on drug trafficking, her government delivered the most dramatic result imaginable. And got the consequences she’d warned about.

What’s next?

Mexico is riding the wave of coolness, the country receiving nearly 100 million international visitors last year. Its tourism economy alone generated $35 billion (approximately R560.10 billion ZAR.) 

That entire industry is now a little jittery thanks to a succession crisis inside an organisation the US designated as a foreign terrorist organisation in February 2025.

President Sheinbaum called for calm on Monday and insisted “peace, security and normalcy are being maintained.” 

The tourists trapped in hotel lobbies were eventually allowed back to their rooms. The 1,000 families in the Guadalajara zoo were let out at daybreak.

But four months before the World Cup kicks off in a city that, 48 hours ago, functioned as a war zone. That word, “normalcy” sure is doing some heavy lifting.