Federico Reyes Heroles
Soccer fever is sweeping everything away. But we’ll return to our grim reality. Growth forecasts are on the decline. They hover around 1% and, in some cases, are even lower. Formal job creation is on the decline. Informal employment is growing. For the first time in recent history, school enrollment is declining across all levels. Just as the world is undergoing a skills revolution driven by AI, young people in Mexico are turning away from high school, technical schools, and universities. For these reasons, social mobility has stalled, and the impact of direct social assistance has already reached its limits. Consumer spending is faltering, and inflation is running rampant.
Despite all the official fanfare about levels of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI), the truth hidden from the general public is that around 90% of it is reinvestment. No new Gross Fixed Capital Formation—that is, actual equipment—is coming in. Mexican investment is flowing out. The divestment in the energy sector over the past decade—specifically in electricity generation and distribution, not to mention the chaos in refining—makes us an unreliable source of energy, a key factor in the new economy. That’s why countries like Vietnam, which doesn’t share a single kilometer of border with the U.S., are overtaking us in nearshoring. Raúl Olmos has already provided a compelling journalistic account: “Fiscal Huachicol.” Francisco Barnés de Castro has laid bare the scale of fuel theft—both “raw” and “fiscal”—which grew rapidly in the first quarter. We’re talking about 165,000 barrels per day. Barnés makes provocative comparisons: if this volume were being stored, it would be equivalent to 80% of the volume of Azteca Stadium or 600 Olympic-sized swimming pools. The deservedly acclaimed—and government-targeted—Carmen Aristegui asks, with common sense, “Store it?” Better to sell it now while prices are high. Where can you store a figure approaching 10 million barrels?
But administrative chaos and corruption on an unprecedented scale overshadow other developments that could be even more serious. A couple of days ago, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) accepted a complaint filed by SIPDH (International Human Rights Services). More than 400 federal judges and Mexican magistrates are speaking out against the destruction of the judiciary. The class-action complaint led the IACHR, an OAS body, to issue an official summons requiring the Mexican government to justify the disastrous reform that dismantled the judicial career path. Mexico has four months to respond.
The damage is perhaps the most profound, as the Mexican State, in the eyes of the world, is broken and shattered, lacking the foundation essential to any nation-State. That is why investment is not coming in, or it is being protected through arbitration of all kinds and partnerships with companies that can litigate abroad. If the IACHR concludes that there have been violations of the American Convention on Human Rights, the case would be referred to the Inter-American Court, whose rulings are binding. The likelihood of this happening is very high. What will the current government do—continue to feign ignorance? All of this is taking place amid trade renegotiations and global transformations that, for this very reason, disqualify us as a destination. The IAPA makes it very clear: “This isn’t about judges defending their positions. It’s about something more troubling: what happens when the person who decides on your freedom, your property, or your family begins to depend on political logic? A judge who has to look to those in power before handing down a ruling ceases to be a judge… and justice ceases to be justice.” And it continues: “There is no democracy without judges.”
Conclusion: “Mexico would have to reform its reform.” Sheinbaum can do it; she has the majority in Congress. She should do it as soon as possible so she can govern for at least four years in a fully functioning state—and not this one, which limps along like a lame duck, because it is lame.
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