Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto nominated Raul Cervantes as the new attorney general of the country on Tuesday (25 October). This is the third recommendation by the president in four years for the same post.

In an official statement from the president's office, Pena Nieto said Arely Gomez — the current attorney general — should serve as head of the Public Administration Ministry, the government's main anti-corruption auditor and Cervantes as the attorney.

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However, both appointments will have to be approved by the Senate.

Cervantes is a senator from the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). Gomez is also a PRI senator, whose tenure was darkened by criticism of the government's inquiry into the case of the 43 missing trainee students in southwest Mexico in September 2014.

It is the same scandal that dogged Gomez's predecessor, Jesus Murillo, who claimed that the students were kidnapped by corrupt police officers and handed over to drug cartel Guerreros Unido, or United Warriors, who then killed them at a rubbish dump and burnt their bodies.

Gomez's name also came up when drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman escaped from a maximum security prison in July 2015, before he was recaptured in January.

The proposal by the president, who has been in office since December 2012, comes as his government faces constant pressure to control rising gang violence and allegations of political corruption in the country.

Mexico