By THE PULSE NEWS MEXICO STAFF

Alejandro Aparicio Santiago, the newly elected mayor of the town of Tlaxiaco, in the central Mexican state of Oaxaca, was gunned down on New Year’s Day, Tuesday, Jan 1.

A member of the now-ruling National Regeneration Movement (Morena), Aparicio Santiago was shot dead during his inaugural ceremony by two unidentified men, who also gravely injured two other local officials.

According to local authorities, one of the suspects has been detained by police and is currently being interrogated.

Oaxaca Governor Alejandro Murat Hinojosa said that there will be a thorough investigation of the murder.

Aparicio Santiago’s execution represents the second high-profile political death since Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) took office on Dec. 1.

On Christmas Eve, newly instated Puebla Governor Martha Erika Alonso and her husband, Rafael Moreno Valle, also a former state governor, died in a yet-unexplained helicopter crash.

Both Alonso and her husband were members of Mexico’s conservative National Action Party (PAN) and were on unfavorable terms with AMLO, who neither attended Alonso’s inauguration nor her funeral, leading to unsubstantiated allegations that his party might have been involved in the accident.