New Delhi: Mexico is set to become the first country in the world to elect all its judges by popular vote after outgoing president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador signed Sunday an official decree for the controversial judicial reform law.
The law which aims to elect over 6,000 judges and magistrates, including those presiding over the Supreme Court, has been met with opposition within and outside the country. The changes are being hailed as “historic” and “people’s will” by those in the government.
Currently, judges and magistrates are appointed by an administrative body known as the Federal Judicial Council.
The law, passed by the Senate, is one of the final goals of President Lopez Obrador. Known to be at loggerheads with the judiciary, the 70-year-old Mexico President has often criticised it for corruption and accused judges of being part of the mafia.
The judicial overhaul brought by him in the last few weeks of his six-year term is a “means to clean up” corruption in courts, he said.
“It’s very important to end corruption and impunity. We will make great progress when it is the people of Mexico who freely elect the judges, the magistrates, the justices,” Lopez told the press. “Judges, with honourable exceptions … are at the service of a predatory minority that has dedicated itself to plundering the country.”
Hoy, en este día histórico, firmé el decreto para la publicación en el Diario Oficial de la Federación de la reforma constitucional al Poder Judicial, aprobada en el Congreso y en la mayoría de las legislaturas locales. Me acompañó como testigo la presidenta electa Claudia… pic.twitter.com/bkfjbpTp1b
— Andrés Manuel (@lopezobrador_) September 16, 2024
While conviction in graft cases is obscure, a government survey suggests that 66 percent of Mexicans perceive judges to be corrupt. The judiciary is also considered a space for nepotism and “influence peddling” with about 37 percent of judicial officials already having at least one family member in the judiciary. And, the new law aims to curtail this issue as well. The new law also reduces the number of SC judges from 11 to 9, reducing the term to 12 years.
Another reason for the overhaul is the presence of drug cartels, which have on several instances pressured judges and threatened to kill them. The new law also states that organised crime can be handled by “anonymous judges”.
According to this new law, elections will take place in two ballots—the first one in 2025 and the other in 2027. Mexicans will vote for judges across various subjects, magistrates, and Supreme Court judges. According to reports, voters will have to manually write on the ballot paper the names of up to 10 preferred candidates for each post.
In Mexico City alone, over 150 positions will see a contest featuring 1,000 candidates. It might take 45 minutes just to fill out ballot papers, experts told Financial Times. According to the president-elect and Lopez Obrador’s successor Claudia Sheinbaum, the vote will cost about $360 million.
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Uproar & diplomatic tensions
The judicial changes have faced severe opposition, with students, federal court workers, judges, and academics protesting against the law. Protestors stormed into the Senate last week to block the vote as lawmakers discussed the Bill. Over 100 judges have opted for early retirement in protest of this law, Financial Times reported.
Supreme Court chief judge Justice Norma Lucia Pina said that elected judges could be more vulnerable to pressure from criminals, in a country where powerful drug cartels regularly use bribery and intimidation to influence officials, Le Monde and AFP reported.
Tyler Mattiace, an Americas researcher at Human Rights Watch, claimed “their (president and president elect’s) focus on how judges are chosen is mistaken. Their proposal will do nothing to address the true bottleneck in Mexico’s justice system: prosecutors’ willingness and capacity to investigate.”
Mexico's Congress approved the first of these 4 dangerous proposals last night.
Starting next year, around 7,000 judges will be summarily removed and replaced.
The other 3 proposals (more pretrial detention, more power to the military, less transparency) are still to come. https://t.co/dN4pG9UrSE
— Tyler Mattiace (@TMattiaceHRW) September 11, 2024
Outside the country, the US and Canada have raised concerns, calling Lopez Obrador’s new law a “risk to democracy” causing diplomatic tensions to arise. US Ambassador to Mexico Ken Salazar’s comments stating that the new law could “threaten” Mexico’s commercial relationship with the US, one of its top trading partners, was termed “disrespectful” to the country’s sovereignty by the president.
Canada’s Ambassador Graeme C. Clark, too, voiced similar concerns claiming that investors are “concerned” over anticipation of increased uncertainty. “My investors are concerned. They want stability. They want a judicial system that works if there are problems,” he said.
A review of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) due by 2026 might be impacted due to the new law. Moody’s Ratings, a New York-based rating agency, has also commented on the issue claiming that the “judicial overhaul will erode checks and balances, risking undermining Mexico’s economic and fiscal strength.”
While the new government with president-elect Claudia Sheinbaum could overturn the law and even set up review committees to convince investors, the country’s first female president has not expressed any intention of doing so as she sat beside President Lopez Obrador when he signed the decree.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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