With reforms, the objective of CFE and Pemex will be public service: Sheinbaum

During the presentation of the scope of the constitutional reforms in energy and railway matters, President Claudia Sheinbaum stressed that they are fundamental modifications to recover the role of the State in both areas. In the first case, he said, it will allow the consolidation of energy sovereignty and, especially, it will allow the central objective of public companies (Federal Commission of Electricity and Mexican Petroleum) to not be commercial, but public service.

In her conference, the president highlighted that in the case of electrical energy, the aim is to consolidate that the public sector will generate 54 percent of the electrical energy supply and the private initiative 46 percent. He questioned the model that was endorsed with the 2013 constitutional reform, shifting the priority nature of the CFE in favor of private companies.

Sheinbaum specified that the constitutional reform initiative that the Chamber of Deputies must discuss this week, contemplates eliminating the definition that was imposed on state public companies with the 2013 reform, which equated them with private companies and forced them to be governed by commercial law. With this, the current proposal aims to return them to being public companies so that they are governed by public law.

With this, the preponderance of the CFE in the generation of electrical energy is guaranteed, because with the 2013 reform, its role was shifted to give private companies a preponderant role. By eliminating the term productive companies of the state it does not mean that we do not want them to be productive, on the contrary, what we seek to eliminate are the conditions that were imposed on them that precisely prevented them from achieving productivity.

The president highlighted that the reform initiative that is in Congress and the subsequent modifications to the secondary laws, the CFE and Pemex resume their strategic role in an energy policy. However, the way in which private initiative will participate in the 46 percent will be regulated based on energy planning that any country must have.

He stressed that the current contracts with the private initiative, including the self-supply mechanism, will be respected but we are going to sit down and discuss the terms in which they will participate in the new scheme.

The objective is not to fight but to sit down and explain the new rules that will come from the constitutional reform and the subsequent reforms to secondary laws. It is clear that the reform gives preponderance to the CFE, which some companies for ideological motivations or private interests, but technical reasons have nothing to do with it.

The Secretary of Energy, Luz Elena González, explained that the 2013 constitutional reform generated adverse conditions for the operation of the CFE and Petróleos Mexicanos for the benefit of private companies, opening strategic areas that were previously reserved for the State. Obtaining economic profitability from private initiative was privileged over the strategic functions of the state.

González said that imposing the character of a productive company of the State “violated the reliability and planning of the CFE because profitability governs the rules of the market.” Furthermore, the CFE did not receive the necessary payment for the transmission and distribution of electrical energy, which affected the governance mechanism of the CFE.

He recalled that already in the government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a process to rescue energy sovereignty began, strengthening Pemex and CFE, with which Mexico currently produces 90 percent of the gasoline it consumes and the CFE 54 percent of the demand for electrical energy. A process of review of the leonine contracts that were signed under the energy reform of 2013 began. It was intended to modify, through the reform of the secondary law, to avoid these excesses but the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation revoked much of it. of these changes on the grounds that they were unconstitutional.

On the other hand, the general director of the Rail Transport Regulatory Agency, Andrés Lajous, referred to the other constitutional reform that has already been approved by the Chamber of Deputies that returns control of the railways to the Mexican State to operate passenger trains. He recalled that through a presidential decree, the former president had already restored this possibility, but now it is elevated to constitutional status.

This modification to the Magna Carta establishes that the operation of railways for the transportation of passengers is a priority for the Mexican State. The reform encourages the State to be able to operate with public companies or through passenger train concessions, which will allow the reconnection of many communities that were only connected through railways.

In this regard, Sheinbaum reported that an investment of 150 billion pesos is planned for 2025, which will be from the public budget, there will be no debt, because it is money that is available due to republican austerity.