”Thus, the secretaries assigned to the Armed Forces currently form the largest group in charge of security in the federal entities. It should be noted that 60% of the security secretaries who come from Semar have been appointed in states governed by Morena,” the report said. “The Other Militarization. Armed Forces at the Head of State Public Security Institutions in Mexico, 2011-2024.”
The report revealed that there is a high turnover in the leadership of state public security secretariats, “which makes the continuity of security policies difficult in the long term.”
States such as Tlaxcala, Michoacán and Guerrero had an average of at least one different head per year, while Yucatán kept the same public security secretary throughout the period analyzed.
“The cases of Sinaloa and Colima show how the prevalence of marines and military personnel in public security departments opens the door to broader processes of militarization, in terms of equipment, operations and crime control tactics, in addition to the expansion of military appointments in municipal security institutions, without clear evidence of their capacity to control violence,” said Sandra Ley, coordinator of the security program at México Evalúa in the presentation of the study.
México Evalúa called attention to the fact that ”entities with security secretaries from the Armed Forces exhibit, on average, higher rates of homicides of men, compared to those entities with secretariats headed by civilians or career police officers.”
”By 2022, states with armed forces in charge of security had an average annual homicide rate of 80 per 100,000 inhabitants, compared to 34 in states with civilians or police.”
“Every day, on average, 85 people are killed in Mexico. This level of violence shows that security policies are failing. Militarization is the most important security strategy today and the most problematic one,” said Estefanía Vela, executive director of Intersecta.
México Evalúa highlighted the importance of investing in police professionalization actions to increase the participation of career police officers in public security departments.
