Politics: Governors’ rebellion de-activated overnight
The federal government’s response, or lack thereof, to this year’s pandemic and economic crisis has become a major focus of a growing number of state governors who have been trying to coordinate efforts to challenge federal policies and develop practical alternatives of their own. But factors of a more historical nature have also been in play.
Ever since the final decades of the 19th century, the national government concluded the only way it could govern a country that had experienced little in the way of stability since gaining independence was by centralizing all power in the federal executive at the expense of state governments. The Mexican Revolution brought an end to that regime, but the governing party that emerged from its ashes became a highly centralized presidentialism with meta-constitutional powers that subjected governors to its needs and whims. Once that system was upset by the PRI’s defeat in the 2000 presidential election, powerful state governors quickly filled the resulting power vacuum. PAN presidents lacking congressional majorities found themselves having to meet demands from such state leaders in exchange for the votes of the federal congressmen they commanded. Gubernatorial administrations wielded unprecedented power and managed the resulting surge in federal funding with little-to-no oversight or accountability. Ever greater corruption scandals ensued even as major structural problems in the federalist system were left unaddressed.
That arrangement came to an end when López Obrador ascended to the presidency with a clear congressional majority, broad public support and plans to re-centralize power in the executive.
Opposition state governors have been working ever since to respond to what they have seen as abuses of power and grave policy errors and omissions, and in the past year have gradually built a series of alliances around alternative policy initiatives and increasingly strong criticisms of key aspects of federal policy. Last week they appeared to be ready for a major showdown, having drafted a list of demands and even calling for the resignation of AMLO’s Covid-19 czar as a condition for attending a meeting with the president they had long demanded. But just hours before the National Governors Conference in San Luis Potosí last Wednesday everything changed with the leak of compromising videos.
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