Senators trust in endorsing the law to regulate pot in the next period

Andrea Becerril and Victor Ballinas

Newspaper La Jornada
Friday May 13, 2022, p. 6

The recent resolution of the Supreme Court, which decriminalized the simple possession of that drug, forces the Senate to conclude the law to regularize cannabis, which began in 2019 and has not been able to materialize, senators from Morena and the opposition agreed.

The president of the Senate, Olga Sánchez Cordero, recalled that the preliminary draft of the opinion prepared based on several initiatives, one presented by her, has made progress and she hoped that it can be enriched and passed on in the next period of sessions.

For his part, the coordinator of the PRD, Miguel Ángel Mancera, commented that the Court’s resolution is very important and re-marks the issue, in the sense that the simple possession of cannabis, set at five grams, should not be penalized.

This coincides, he stressed, with the draft legislation being analyzed in the Senate, in which simple possession rises to 18 grams and there is no criminal sanction for anyone who finds that amount of cannabis intended for personal consumption.

Likewise, the Morena coordinator, Ricardo Monreal, commented that he hopes to build consensus with all the parliamentary groups to approve this pending legislation since the beginning of the legislature. It is essential, because everywhere and everywhere products made with marijuana or marijuana itself are sold for consumption. You have to open your eyes to reality.

The resolution implies a determination insofar as the Public Ministry will not take criminal action against anyone who is a drug addict or a stubborn consumer and possesses cannabis for their strict personal consumption, and does so outside the places indicated in the Health Law itselfhe highlighted.

He noted that there should be no persecution against consumers, nor penalization against producers and therefore to regulate marijuana is to protect the right to free development of personality.

He recognized that it is a controversial issue, there are groups and political forces, people who do not want marijuana to be legalized, but Mexico is behind because the use of marijuana for recreational, medicinal and industrial purposes has been legalized worldwide.

On the subject, Mancera recalled that after intense legislative work for more than two years, the Senate approved the General Law for the Regulation of Cannabis in 2020, but the deputies made substantive changes to it that distorted it, so it was decided to prepare a new opinion, which is the one that will be analyzed within the special group that was formed for that purpose, of which it is a part.

The PRD coordinator considered that the law should be approved in the ordinary period of September, because it is one of the pending issues that cannot be ignored. “We have to create a new law, because it is not possible to continue like this, even with contradictions, while there are more and more hemp-based products.

On the one hand, he exemplified, the regulation in the Ministry of Health establishes that cannabis-based medicines can be imported, but on the other hand, the respective tariff marks them as prohibited. That’s what can’t happen anymore.