His coalition will win the majority of the disputed governorships. The mandate revocation consultation will be carried out, which will hardly meet the participation percentage to be binding, but it will find a way to maintain that the people ratified it, that the conservatives lost and, incidentally, will wear down the legitimacy of the INE.
Whether or not the electricity reform is approved, it will take advantage of its discussion to mobilize its bases, exacerbate polarization, put the PRI on the ropes and position its narrative. It will continue to issue decrees of dubious legality and will use those provisions to advance its agenda, while the Supreme Court defines whether they are constitutional or not.
However, the great risk is that AMLO is a political animal: he follows his instincts and his innate abilities. However, politics is always thinking in the short term: the next election, the next legislative term, the next party summit.
Consequently, the president is leaving great long-term governance risks (such as militarization or institutional weakening) and, in the medium term, control of his party and the presidential succession could slip out of his hands.
We’ll see. For now, López Obrador will have a successful 2022.
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Editor’s Notes:
Jacques Coste (Twitter: @ jacquescoste94) is a historian and author of the book Human Rights and Politics in Mexico: The Constitutional Reform of 2011 in Historical Perspective, which will be published in the spring of 2022, under the editorial seal of the Mora y Tirant Lo Blanch Institute. It also carries out consulting activities in the field of political analysis.
The opinions in this article are the sole responsibility of the authors.
