Politics: Infighting heats up in Camp 4T
Last week, an audio recording was leaked of Minister of the Environment Víctor Manuel Toledo sharing with top members of his staff a blistering critique of the government of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and its failure to seriously pursue the “regime change” he promised with his claim to be presiding over Mexico’s fourth historical transformation (4T) since its independence from Spain.
Infighting between competing politicians and bands within the governing camp is nothing new, and there has been a steady trickle of public officials resigning or being forced out at all levels of federal service almost since Day One of this administration. But Toledo’s assessment was significant not only for its coming from among the most devoted 4T true believers, but also for its scope. Not only does he recognize that the 4T has never risen to a set of clear and finished objectives, but he also questions the president’s commitment to any such project or even the most basic aspects of environmental policy. He also complains of being lobbied by the National Palace to cease investigations into environmental law violations by corporations.
The portrait of a project riddled by contradictions and a chronic lack of coordination and policy coherence helps explain why we are witnessing more and more conflicts at all levels of the administration, among members of Congress claiming fealty to the 4T from radically different angles, and even within AMLO’s Morena and allied parties. With its lack of clear objectives, the 4T is rife with contradictions, coordination deficiencies and omissions when it comes to defining the direction in which the government wants to move. Such tensions and defections will tend to mount as we get closer to the 2021 nationwide elections and the candidate selection processes that precede it.
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