President Peña Nieto moves to abolish municipal police....really Enrique?

By Chivis Martinez for Borderland Beat

Iguala fosas of May 2014

The critical eye of the world has focused on Mexico and its president since global media began reporting, that 43 normalistas, students were missing from the Guerrero City of Iguala.  

It took over a week for the global press to latch on to the story, but the story became viral, and a trendy cause for groups to support and demonstrate in support of.  At the direction of a mayor and the first lady, 43 young students studying to become teachers,  were kidnapped by municipal police, and handed over to executioners of organized crime, "Guerreros Unidos".  

How can this happen?

This reporter has been angry, frustrated and sadden that the media has latched on to this heart-wrenching  story and have not penetrated deep into the surface story to find the depth of the  horror.   

Any BB reader knows what the world is yet to discover, that here at BB were have reported over 50 stories in the last year of  the Iguala region where hundreds of people have been taken, in groups of 10, 20, 30, entire families, school children, just regular citizens not remotely connected to criminality.   Kidnapped, and never seen again.  We have reported dozens of bodies discovered by citizens, and authorities, 32 in August, over 100 in the 6 months before the 43.

People near the landfill, who cut across the landfill,  as a short cut, reported finding 300 bodies in 2 years.  In that landfill alone.  They report that treading on the landfill area after dark is the kiss of death.  That is when the executions occur.  Gunshots heard….6-8-10 or more, pierce through the silence of the night.  And people know, in the morning corpses will be seen.  People say it is not every night, but regularly.

People, including the parents of the 43, say they reported the acts genocide to both the Calderon administration and  Peña administration.  They called on the PGR federal agency to conduct investigations, they pleaded with them.  They were told it was a state issue, a local issue.  But... pleaded the people, the state and local government are criminals, they are in collusion with the bad guys, they ARE the bad guys.   Yet, they were turned away.
 

And the killing continued.  

I ask how is it that a town of only 120k population have hundreds of bodies discovered?  A resident wrote to me and said I was wrong, the numbers are over 1000.  At first I thought that was emotion doing the calculation,  I then did the math, and concede over 1000 is very feasible.

The government has not addressed the bodies discovered in the search for the 43.  Nor have they set up a DNA bank of specimens from families of the missing.  They are eyeballing the 43, nothing more.  Because the world is watching.  Why hasn't the feds gone to Guerrero and unearthed the areas of known fosas?  Why is it the a group of 70 families and autodefensas had to venture on their own over the weekend, with picks and axes dig the earth and they themselves discovered 11 fosas?
 

Enrique Peña, the president that TIME MAGAZINE proclaimed as the savior of Mexico in a laughable and outrages magazine cover, ( sparking a flood of mock covers) has been forced to give the appearance of  taking action.

Peña has now announced the abolishment of municipal police with a federal takeover.  He plans to put  local police units under federal control then state oversight

Via television he said; "Mexico cannot continue like this, after Iguala, Mexico must change. Our country has been shaken by cruelty and barbarism."

He proposes a cachet of changes and constitutional reforms, whereby Mexico’s 1,800 municipal forces to be abolished and taken over by state agencies, with initial oversight by feds.

The reform would also permit Congress to disband local governments infiltrated by drug cartels.

When Felipe Calderon’s presidency was winding down, he made a couple of admissions.  One was that in the border states of Mexico there were an estimated 25,000 bodies in clandestine fosas (graves).  The other admission is that every, that is 100% folks, of all municipalities in the border states are controlled by organized crime. This is not news to the Peña administration or anyone living along the border.

No doubt Peña wants the controversy to go away, and he is hoping the “trend of the #43” will disappear, just as the students did.  Surely, he never dreamed that anyone outside the indigenous community would be emotionally moved,  about dark skinned “peasants” being subjected to atrocities.  

But react he must,  at least to give the impression that his administration is reacting, listening to the cries of the people.

Do I believe he is sincere? 

Hell-to-the-NO.  

When the 43 kidnappings transpired, he had a scheduled trip to Chilpancingo, Guerrero, he cancelled, citing “weather”, the only bad weather he would have faced is a crowd of angry Guerrero citizens demanding action and answers. 

He never dreamed that in a few weeks the world would know…..and would be watching, and studying what actions he would take.

He says, for now, his plan will be initiated in four of the most violent states of Mexico; Guerrero, Michoacán , Jalisco and Tamaulipas.

The new municipal police will be under the control of the state.  Problem right off the top: State police agencies are also corrupted.  Many of the leaders of organized crime groups are recruited from state and federal police agencies. 

The overhaul would begin in Mexico's four most violent states, he said - Tamaulipas, Jalisco, Michoacán and Guerrero. Under President Pena Nieto's plans, the thousands of local police forces would come under the control of the 31  state governments, and the capital.

Some  have speculated about  Martial law, for all intent and purpose that is a virtual impossibility.  It would require Peña evoking Article 29 of the Mexican constitution, and the potential revoking of freedoms specified in the Mexican Constitution, such as press, assembly, due process, etc 

But citizens need not be occupied by the potential of marital law, article 29 would require the approval by Mexico’s irritable congress.  

So what remains, is Peña’s proposal of abolishment of municipal police.  Like the United States, Mexico gives their “United States”, autonomy.   That places in to great question: Can states and be forced to adapt what Peña proposes.

I asked my friend, who happens to be an attorney, and whose opinion I value immensely, if Peña can impose his municipal plan.  

He answered; that Peña can’t force a group of jurisdictions to adopt a single police force.  To do so would require extensive constitutional amendment. 

Further stating, “EPN has to change not just the self-government provisions, but also the federal funds distribution provisions, since he needs to use federal funds as the carrot and stick.” 

“EPN could avoid all these largely symbolic measures by simply using the laws currently in place to prosecute corrupt government officials. But that would mean that the elite would have to go after its own members.”

Anyone think that will happen?  I am still waiting for the grand thief of my state of Coahuila,  to get his due.

After mass protests and demonstrations, and caught in a net of global disapproval and scrutiny, Peña is forced to speak of change.  But how seriously can one consider any action or talk of action by this president who in his speech of “change”, then adds the comment:

“In terms of respect for and protection of human rights, Mexico has one of the strongest regulatory systems in the world.”

Concerning is that the world press covering this story of  Peña’s proposed plans, have not been critical or pointing towards the fallacy of such a plan.

Hopefully academics and legal minds will not allow Peña’s plan to be scoffed at without public dismantling of both the feasibility and legality of each point.  The world press and scholars can be proactive and insert a  justice into Pena’s ludicrousness, by not allowing this sham to go without reproach.