Antonio Navalón
Contrary to everything the rest of us were able to see, could it be that President López Obrador realized that the decision to go ahead with the CUSMA/USMCA/T-MEC – in my view, inevitable – will again widen the gap in the social imbalance between the North and the South as never before? I believe this is the origin of his insatiable desire and interest to give the South, the part of Mexico that saw him grow and develop, the major projects of his six-year term. Just look and analyze, for example, where Dos Bocas is located. It seems a coincidence, but the reality is that the Mexican President was not going to let his mandate be in vain, nor would he allow his home state to remain empty-handed. A refinery that has brought nothing but difficulties, but a refinery and a source of wealth that – together with the Mayan Train and against the criteria of the defenders of the Earth – he has arduously endeavored to move forward despite the environmental or any other kind of consequences.
It is necessary to question whether López Obrador made these types of decisions because he knows that – inevitably, in the twilight of his six-year term and when the CUSMA/USMCA/T-MEC is becoming more and more relevant and gaining more ground – Mexico and Central America will be substantially marked by an enormous gap in the development of the trilateral instrument. As each day passes and the effects and consequences of the implementation of the CUSMA/USMCA/T-MEC become more evident, the intangible division will be marked from Mexico City to Alaska and the other from the gates of Iztapalapa in Mexico City to Belize and Guatemala.
The poor first. Although the Mexican leader never clarified what kind of poverty he was referring to or how – assuming it was his goal – he would do anything to stop them from being poor. He has committed and has invaded the national budget to help ensure that poverty will never know a bad fortnight. Even if one can never stop being poor, at least one will have enough to buy tortillas and a few other things to put in their mouth.
It is difficult to calculate what the implementation or the boomerang effect of the CUSMA/USMCA/T-MEC will mean in practical terms, but what is clear is that – given the territories, the industries, and the people affected – the CUSMA/USMCA/T-MEC is not only an economic revolution but, above all, it is a social revolution. It is not possible to progress without people who are willing to work. And on this issue, Mexico has plenty of people ready to get ahead and some Canadian towns with less social complexity. Please tell me how else we will fix the migration problem.
Ergo, we live in a world in which, inevitably, to develop growth, we will have to transform the walls, those of cement and iron that are guarded by thousands of guards at the border, for incentives and work permits so that those who can develop and help the development of all can leave, not being persecuted but being cared for beyond the borders that mark the real elements that unite or separate peoples.
Another necessary element to understand the complex panorama we are facing is to visualize the composition of the Mexican Gross Domestic Product. If one analyzes the contribution per federal entity, one can realize that if one adds up the more than 3.7 billion pesos of Mexico City; plus the more than 2.2 billion pesos of the State of Mexico, plus the 2.16 billion pesos of Nuevo Leon; and the more than 1.759 billion pesos of Jalisco, one will realize that the stability and development of the country are rooted in these four federal entities. Four entities out of 32 represent 40% of our country’s Gross Domestic Product. This means that these federal entities are the ones that will indeed be able to give Mexico a direction and establish the levels of technological, material, and financial development within the framework of the TMEC. In addition, the analysis of the contribution to GDP by federal entities shows that, except for Nuevo León, the most significant contributions come from the country’s Central and South Central regions. This curious and extremely undervalued State contributes to the national GDP of nearly 5% and concentrates close to 6.5% of the total population. In a different section, I leave Veracruz.
Was he not so wrong in betting on the poor and the South of the country? I do not know how he thought he could fix the situation, but what is certain is that now, at the end of his term and at the time of assessing the balance of his six-year term, the South appears as an area that deserves and has the right to at least a compensatory and balancing policy in terms of the present social inequality. Nevertheless, believe me when I say that the South is destined to be the great shadow of the North’s development, which is why there is so much complication when defining the areas of influence.
Currently, the world is facing many unknowns about development that we do not know how they can be solved, although we do know something essential. If growth, strength, and money will flow from Mexico City to Alaska, what will be left to be distributed in the territory from the gates of Iztapalapa to Belize? And I refer to Belize as a small country that has all the advantages and disadvantages of being part of the geographical area in which it is located. Four federal entities concentrate almost 35% of the total population of the country and, consequently, a large percentage of the votes at the national level, four entities in which – if the preferences are not balanced and without a clear element that gives hope to all those who feel unfortunate and abandoned by the hand of God – we will have an unprecedented confrontation.
The current polarization of Mexican society is such that it is unpredictable to say what will happen in 2024. However, what is increasingly clear is that we need a plan or a strategy that seeks to include all the sectors that make up the country or at least as many as possible. If we do not harmonize the country, we will have a confrontation similar to the one that, in his time, the caudillo Emiliano Zapata wanted to resolve by giving everyone what they deserved or worked for.
The explanation for the above lies in need for the time elapsed since Zapata until now to improve internal relations between the country and the countries. We must find the foundations to establish and develop social pacts that transcend presidential terms and social classes or statuses. We also need to invent systems that give way to and facilitate development, systems in which the political offer is no longer based and sustained on the inevitable exit of the current president but that it must propose and incorporate a possible solution that allows the South to come back into existence. But, above all, the two parts of the country be homogeneous and collaborate in an increasingly egalitarian way for the country’s development.
Naturally, in this manifestation of concern and possible development, the most critical task will be to ensure that education once again becomes a balancing factor and not a factor confirming the failure of a political system. We must recover education as a synthesis of national development and prevent it from gradually disappearing, replacing books with tortillas and hopes and the capacity for growth with resignation.
No surprise. This week has possibly been the most tense since the beginning of the six-year term. López Obrador’s confrontation against the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation has not only made him lose – from the legal point of view – two of his most important battles, but, above all, it has shown that he can be defeated. For someone who thinks that the Law is not important, that it is more important to be certain of what is in the country’s best interest, and someone who is against the limits imposed by the legal and constitutional structures, the confrontation never ends. These elements and the unnecessary nationalization of the Ferrosur infrastructure mark a point of no return and send a message about his intentions. Many have not understood it, but it is clear that President López Obrador wants to show with these actions that he will be sending another one for every Law that is suspended or rejected. For every manifestation, declaration, or action against his orders, he will respond, and he will do so with greater strength and using the force of the State since, for him, no one can say no to him or who is against him. There is no surprise in anything he is doing, but now we have arrived, and we are beginning the final act of the 2024 election.
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