President of Mexico, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, during a press conference. Photo: EneasMx via wikimedia commons, CC BY 4.0.
(Montevideo, 27. August 2024, The Daily).- In a press conference on Tuesday morning, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador AMLO announced a pause in relations between the Mexican government and the embassies of the United States and Canada after their representatives criticized the judicial reform and pointed out that the direct election of judges represents a threat to democracy in the country.
AMLO calls for respect for Mexico’s sovereignty
The president told the media that he would not ask the ambassadors to leave the country, but that they should “read the constitution and that is like giving them a dressing down,” according to Mexican website Animal Político.
The president, who will leave office on October 1, the day of the handover of power to Claudia Sheinbaum, hopes that diplomatic representatives will respect Mexico’s independence and sovereignty. “As long as that is not the case and they continue with this policy, there will be a break with the US embassy and also with the Canadian embassy,” AMLO added.
“We will not give them advice or tell them what is right or wrong, we want them to be respectful, we want there to be a mutual relationship based on respect for sovereignty,” the president added.
Last week, the US ambassador to Mexico, Ken Salazar, issued a statement warning that the direct election of judges, the central element of the reform promoted by the government, posed a threat to democracy and that the resulting debate would trigger a turbulent period that could undermine economic integration in North America.
For his part, Canadian Ambassador to Mexico Graeme C. Clark said that Canadian investors had expressed their concerns about the judicial reform, particularly that it could undermine the relationship of trust between investors and the Mexican government.
The two diplomats’ comments come at a time when international rating agencies and banks are warning of the risks and potential impact of a possible adoption of the judicial reform on the economy.
The planned judicial reform
The plan of President AMLO and his party, the National Regeneration Movement (Morena), to reform the judicial system received an important boost on Monday when the Constitutional Commission of the Chamber of Deputies approved the proposal for implementation.
The reform initiative proposes that all federal judges, including members of the Supreme Court, be elected by popular vote. This has sparked controversy with the opposition, which warns that this could endanger democracy. Although the commission could amend the draft law in future votes, the main reform, which provides for the election of judges, has a good chance of remaining in the legislation, France 24 reports.
The proposed reform of the Mexican justice system has passed its first test with 22 votes from Morena and its allies, the “Partidos del Trabajo” (PT) and the “Verde Ecologista” party (PVEM), against 17 votes from the opposition.
The resolution, which includes 100 amendments proposed by Morena, provides for two elections to renew the judicial system, with the first extraordinary convocation scheduled for June 2025.
The ruling party plans to vote on the reform in plenary in September, once it has the two-thirds majority in Congress necessary for a constitutional amendment after the deputies elected in the last elections take office.
Despite the imminent adoption of the judicial reform proposed by AMLO, opposition representatives have expressed their opposition, fearing for the independence of the judiciary.
López Obrador announces “pause” in US-Canada relations by Nachrichtenpool Lateinamerika is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International.
