Politics: IMSS head quits, dysfunction grows
Last week’s decision by the head of the Mexican Social Security Institute to step down was the first cabinet level defection to date in this administration. It also provided the first open statement from within the government of discontent with many ways in which this administration is attempting to operate.
Referring specifically to the IMSS, the departing director criticized irrationally deep and misplaced budget cuts for wreaking havoc on public health services and driving desperate patients to assume the out-of-pocket expense of private sector alternatives. He also complained that the government has tended to turn a deaf ear to any and all suggestions by officials such as himself, who are effectively being sidelined by counterparts in the finance ministry who are under presidential orders to implement deep cuts in the pursuit of balanced public finance, as well as to raise funds for entirely new government programs that have yet to take shape.
This dysfunctional approach has been reflected to varying degrees in the emergence of at least five major crises in the provisioning of public services during an administration that has been in office for barely six months.
Similar criticisms are being made with regard to programs and institutions throughout the system. AMLO’s continuing indifference to desperate appeals by such officials sends two clear messages. First, there will be no exceptions to the strict implementation of his republican austerity and massive reallocation of resources away from many crucial government programs and agencies toward new ones and priority investment projects, regardless of the political and social costs. And second, there is no room in this government for expressing opinions other than those of the president, or raising any kind of ideas that might be interpreted as suggesting that a presidential policy might lead to negative consequences. Loyalty, discipline, obedience, and submission to AMLO's decisions are prerequisites for being part of the cabinet.
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