Mexico’s López Obrador seeks constitutional reform on electricity, elections and National Guard

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said this Tuesday that between now and 2023 he will present to the Chamber of Deputies three constitutional reforms: on the electricity sector, on the National Electoral Institute, and on the National Guard.

“The reforms that we are going to promote are basically three, and (they will be given) in due time because the main constitutional reforms have already been approved,” said the president during his morning press conference from the National Palace.

As he had anticipated on June 10, the President detailed that the first reform initiative is related to “strengthening the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE)” and indicated that he expects to present it at the end of this year or at the latest at the beginning of 2022.

Although at the beginning of 2021 the President sent a legal -but not constitutional- reform bill regarding electric energy, a series of judicial appeals have prevented it from moving forward, which has generated a confrontation between the Mexican Government and large companies.

This constitutional reform, he indicated, will seek, among other things, that 56% of the electricity transmission market will be for CFE and 46% will remain in the hands of private companies.

“A reform was made to a law to solve this problem, but the law to solve this problem had not yet been published and the amparos (suits for injunction) began (to be filed). So what is left for us? A constitutional reform,” said López Obrador.

REFORM THE INE

The second priority reform, he affirmed, will be the one related to the National Electoral Institute (INE) to give independence to the organization in the election process “so that conservatism does not dominate”.

However, he clarified that he still does not know if he will propose only the renewal of the electoral body or the creation of a new one, although he did emphasize that it must be an independent body.

This initiative, he said, will be presented in 2022.

During the electoral process of the mid-term elections held last June 6, López Obrador harshly criticized the current INE and its head, and had already announced his intention to reform the body.

THE NATIONAL GUARD

Meanwhile, his third reform proposal will be related to the National Guard because, he affirmed “I do not want what happened with the Federal Police to happen, which was integrated (to other ministries) and went to waste”.

He pointed out that after his term of office the National Guard, which is currently attached to the Secretariat of Security and Citizen Protection (SSPC), will be part of the Secretariat of National Defense.

In this way, it will be avoided that, for example, it ends up in the hands of the Ministry of the Interior “or any other institution, and that in 6 years it will be ruined”.

However, he asserted that this public security body legally born on March 26, 2019 after a controversial constitutional reform, needs to be further consolidated so it is possible that this initiative will be presented in 2023.

The National Guard was created as a civilian military body attached to the Ministry of Security, but from the very beginning it received strong criticism because most of its members come from the Army and its head is a retired military officer.