Ricardo Pascoe Pierce
President Sheinbaum’s speech in Querétaro on February 5 was a masterful piece that lucidly illustrated the political confusion her government finds itself in. The heroic phrases of the speech, reminiscent of the left of the 1960s, reflect how her thinking is frozen in the past and has given up on developing new concepts and paradigms in the face of a changing world, with real processes of rupture, and is therefore extremely dangerous.
A hodgepodge of phrases emanating from a left-wing longing for the revolution of years past, concepts of PRI nationalism from the 1920s, and, finally, seasoned with Bolivarian populism in the midst of extinction, constructed a speech in Querétaro that describes a world in the process of extinction.
To the cry of “Mexico will be neither a colony nor a protectorate of anyone,” Sheinbaum spoke of something that no one is even proposing or thinking about. Mexico has never been a colony of anyone. It was part of the Spanish Empire and later separated from Spain after a long war, achieving independence from the Mother Country and becoming a constitutional republic. Much less has it been a protectorate of any country.
What is true is that Mexico is a party to multiple regional and international agreements that regulate some of the country’s rules of conduct in economic, financial, fiscal, accountability, environmental, labor, social, and political-democratic matters. Mexico does not live in a bubble. It is a member of the global community and, as such, receives attention and assumes responsibilities.
The president also claimed that “Mexico does not bow down, kneel, surrender, or sell out.” But the president is wrong in her argument. If she is so afraid that Mexico could “bow down, kneel, surrender, or sell out,” the normal and obvious thing to do would be to call for the broadest possible unity throughout the country, set aside her party’s sectarian interests, and propose a government of national unity. But that is not her purpose or her intention. In fact, she intends to propose an electoral reform that will enable her party to remain in power indefinitely and, therefore, exclude other parties from power.
In contrast to the president’s sectarian intentions, both the president of the Chamber of Deputies and the governor of Querétaro called on the federal government to present an electoral reform proposal based on consensus, not just the official party. So far, there are no signs that this unified call has received presidential attention. If the national situation is as serious as the president says, it would be a great political gesture to call on all national forces to save the country. Such an undertaking has not happened, and most likely will not happen.
Moreover, in her historical argument, which was unnecessary, the president insisted on dividing the country into irreconcilably opposed camps, both before and now. The president insisted that “during 36 years of the neoliberal period, anti-popular, submissive reforms contrary to the public interest were promoted.” In contrast, she argued that the Cuatroté has restored the social essence of the 1917 Constitution. For the president, there is nothing unusual about her party securing 74% of the seats in the National Congress with only 54% of the popular vote. She will say this is the Constitution’s social essence. Or that her party has been and continues to be an objective ally of drug trafficking in the country. That too is essentially social in nature. And the electoral reform she will propose is necessary to “consolidate” social advances and to curb the return of the “conservatives.” Accountability is demanded by reactionaries who intend to denigrate her heroic feat.
Along with the declaration that Mexico belongs only to her party, Sheinbaum stated that Mexico will not accept interventions “such as coups d’état, interference in elections, or the violation of Mexican territory.” She added, for clarity, that “Mexico will never surrender its natural resources.”
What the president painted in Querétaro was a picture of how she perceives the country. Mexico, says Sheinbaum, is under siege from abroad and faces the possibility of a coup d’état. Any observer would say that the situation is not simply serious. It is extremely serious, and the country is at risk of suffering an even greater grievance.
But even so, the Cuatroté governs by promoting exclusion, sectarianism, and polarization. It does not unite the country. It continues to divide it, under the idea that this division strengthens its mandate. It follows the script left by López Obrador for winning elections. Polarization is ideal for winning at the polls and scaring the population. But what Sheinbaum has described is something else: a warning of a possible national collapse.
The entire Querétaro speech is directed at Donald Trump. It was a letter to him. It was a sign of how upset Sheinbaum is with the president of the United States. These are surely opinions she did not express to him in their many telephone conversations, which have always been “cordial and productive.” She needed the shelter of Querétaro and the applause of the public, which grants absolute impunity, to speak her “truths.”
But those truths place the president, once again, at an existential crossroads as Mexico’s leader. Mexico is not an autonomous country. It is an independent country, but it is not autonomous in the sense of existing without regard to external factors. Especially the factor called the United States. The country to the north defines our economy. That is, the very subsistence of the nation and its population.
In contrast to the United States, Cuba is an ideological footnote on the Caribbean map. The island is irrelevant to both the Mexican economy and society. In the past, it had some relevance during the Cold War. Today, it is a model of a failed revolution, about to disappear. Therefore, defending Cuba as if it were an extension of Mexico seems absurd, as did much of what the president said in Querétaro.
She placed Mexico on the brink of an abyss. She did so, but she was surely thinking of Cuba. That island is indeed on the verge of collapse. Mexico is not. That is why the president’s alarmist tone shows her to be completely out of touch with the geopolitical reality of Mexico, Latin America, the United States, and the world.
What should concern the Cuatroté is its imminent isolation on the North American, Latin American, and global stage. The Sao Paulo Forum, the Puebla Group, and the allies of China, Russia, and Iran have not shown up, and they are not going to. China and Russia are not rushing to save Cuba; apart from a few statements of solidarity, they are not going to do so. Mexico’s humanitarian support for Cuba is intended to massage the guilty conscience of the radical sector of Morena, but it remains irrelevant. Behind it all, Mexico’s isolation is confirmed. In the Latin American context, it no longer has any relevant allies.
It is a costly isolation that heroic speeches cannot resolve. Rather, it requires strategic thinking, an understanding of the new global geopolitics, and a clear definition of Mexico’s strategic objectives and interests. Until all this is defined, and it is clearly not defined, Mexico will continue to live on speeches devoid of strategic content, revealing its confusion about how to weave its own decisions into a world of interests and commitments. It nullifies its ability to address its real needs. If it does not understand them, it cannot resolve them. This is what Mexico’s great loneliness consists of.
@rpascoe
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