What is the Executive’s proposal on the OPLEs?
In the electoral reform initiative of the Federal Executive, the aim is to “lower” the cost of the electoral bodies, for which it is proposed to replace the INE with the National Institute of Elections and Consultations (INEC) and that it be the only one in charge of the organization of the elections, their supervision and even declare their validity, for which it would absorb the functions of the local public organisms.
“It would organize all the electoral processes of the republic, at the national, state and municipal levels,” it is stated, under the argument that there would be savings of 24 billion pesos.
On this last point, former electoral counselor Marco Antonio Baños refuted such figures by recalling that all the electoral reforms that have been made in the country, in one way or another, have allowed the Mexican electoral system to be strengthened.
He even commented to Political Expansion that the 2013-2014 electoral reform did not finish strengthening the national election system, but currently it “works and works well and allows elections to be held without any problem.”
From his point of view, the electoral reform of the Federal Executive clearly seeks a control scheme over the electoral authority.
“It is regressive and seeks, through a constitutional reform of secondary laws, as was done with the Electoral Institute of Mexico City (IECM), to control the electoral authority, which would be absolutely serious.
“The conversion of the INE to the INEC would be somewhat regressive; first, because it is said that 24,000 million would be saved with the disappearance of the electoral bodies of the states and with the assumption of the elections in their entirety by the INE, ”he stressed.
He explains that those 24,000 million are nothing more than the sum of the budgets of the OPLEs, regardless of whether or not the budgets they took as a basis included the costs of elections in progress.
“I say that it cannot be done, because the INE does not have the structure to hold elections, nor the experience to hold elections like the ones held in Oaxaca, where 2/3 of the more than 500 town halls are held due to uses and customs. . In addition, the same problem is faced in states like Chiapas or Guerrero, so the INE would have to grow by about 40%, so where are the savings that the President of the Republic says? ”, He questioned.
