Under the PRI, the president chose his successor in secret and revealed him later. The cartoonist Abel Quezada is credited with creating the figure of el tapado, “the covered one.” His best-known cartoon shows a hooded man smoking, with the line “El tapado fuma Elegantes” (The covered one smokes Elegantes).
While the name stayed covered, the press read the signs. In 2017, the political writer Carlos Castillo described how the media “interpretan señales, gestos y guiños” (interpret signals, gestures and winks) to guess the choice.