▲ Yesterday the forums in which the Executive’s proposals for a new general water law will be analyzed began in the Chamber of Deputies, with the participation of specialists and producers.Photo The Day
Fernando Camacho and Enrique Méndez
La Jornada Newspaper
Wednesday, November 19, 2025, p. 6
The presidential initiatives for a new general water law and changes to the National Water Law received criticism from agricultural producers, experts and legislators at the start of the forums to discuss it, because, as they are written, they allow concessions in the hands of large companies and banks such as Ricardo Salinas Pliego to be extended for speculative purposes.
Morena’s parliamentary group in the Chamber of Deputies said it did not fear that the Executive’s proposal would generate rejection, although it admitted the possibility that it might undergo some modifications. The coordinator of the bench, Ricardo Monreal Ávila, reported that the goal is to approve the opinion in committees in the first days of December, so that it can be sent for review by the Senate before the end of the period of ordinary sessions.
During the first day of the talks that began yesterday and will last until Friday in San Lázaro, attendees also questioned the fact that the Executive’s proposal gives the National Water Commission (Conagua) excessive “power of interpretation” of the regulations, which would open the door to “uncertainty and conflict.”
One of the specialists who questioned the wording of both laws was Miguel Ángel Montoya, who warned that it is “absolutely not sustainable” for the authorities to renew the liquid concessions that large companies have just because they request it.
President Claudia Sheinbaum’s bills, he said, not only do they not eliminate the so-called guarantee fee, which facilitates this scenario, but they also allow companies to renew it for two more periods, of two years each.
An example of this practice is the concession title granted by the Aguas del Valle de México Basin Organization to Banco Azteca (owned by Salinas Pliego) to extract up to 2 million 200 thousand cubic meters of water per year, which it has not used. And you just have to pay the guarantee fee to keep it valid.
“Iztapalapa would like to have that (in reference to the volume of water concessioned to Banco Azteca)! And what do they use it for? For speculation. I ask the deputies to take care of the President and avoid litigating based on those interests,” he remarked.
For his part, Guillermo Narváez Ávila, representative of the National Committee of the Garlic Product System, asked the deputies not to include in the proposal a section that would give Conagua the power to resolve the procedures related to concession titles, since there could even be a retroactive application of the laws.
“The power of interpretation that is granted to the authority – warned the Zacatecas farmer – is inadmissible, since it opens the door to uncertain criteria and implies the need to make administrative clarifications or even generate eventual litigation. Just everything that those of us who dedicate ourselves to working the land do not need.”
Also from Zacatecas, producer Karina López Puentes called on the Executive to better choose the people in charge of drafting bills. “They must have more sensitivity, they must be people who really know what the situation is in the field; they must not be desk-based,” he emphasized.
Just yesterday, questioned about the criticism and resistance to the two proposals sent by the Executive, Ricardo Monreal accepted that the documents may have changes.
“I hope that the initiative can be endorsed by the majority. However, I do warn that it can still be modified. There is openness, there is sensitivity on the part of the deputies and the parliamentary group (cherry). The discussion is open,” he assured.
