Institutional cynicism

National

The public institutions are in bad reputation

Institutional cynicism

By: Carlos Damian                                                               March 10, 2015

Magistrate Galvan trusts in that there are elections in Guerrero

México. -   The magistrate of the Electoral Tribunal of the Judicial Power of the Federation (TEPJF, for their initials in Spanish) Flavio Galvan Rivera (FGR), he said yesterday (02/23/15) that the elections foreseen for next June will be developed in the context of a crisis of credibility in the national, included institutions the electoral ones, and he affirmed that it is in hands of the citizenship to give dependability to the process. The admission is disturbing, serious and infuriating, not only to come from who comes, but also for the present circumstance, when the Electoral National Institute (INE, for their initials in Spanish) it crosses for a precocious decomposition, to less than one year of having been founded, after seven of the 10 parties with registration abandoned the sessions of the General Council to consider that some of the consultants, included the president, Lorenzo Cordova, they exhibit an openly partial attitude toward the governing party (PRI). But the bad reputation of the INE and of the TEPJF, it didn't begin the previous week. At least in the two last presidential elections both organisms and their leaderships have had a disastrous acting for their own prestige, for the democracy, and for the institutional fabric in general.  Some days ago, the TEPJF discharged the PRI of all blame in the call “case Monex", in spite of the flagrant indications that that political institute appealed in 2012 to operations with resources of uncertain origin, it surpassed the expenses roof of political campaign and it distributed money in massive form, by means of debit cards -Monex and Soriana, mainly - among the electorate. In spite of such indications and documental tests, August 31, 2012 the own Galvan declared that the elections of the previous month had been free and authentic and they had been characterized by a “permanent justness". As questionable as that verdict it was missing action of the Electoral Federal Institute (IFE, for their initials in Spanish), previously headed by Leonardo Valdes. Plus it is still worse if six years before, in September of 2006, Galvan Rivera, being then a president from the TEPJF -charge to which gave up in 2007, after being known presumed acts of corruption, Norma Ines Aguilar León -, it endorsed a dirty verdict by means of the one which the jurisdictional organ president declared to Felipe Calderon, although the same document recognized the commission of serious electoral irregularities then for the president Vicente Fox, the Managerial Coordinating Council and PAN. In that occasion. The IFE, presided over in this time by Luis Carlos Ugalde, was also accomplice of the vast and documented dirt of that time and it was apparent its subjection to the Executive Power.   Crisis of credibility  The next electoral process of June -where it will be chosen to federal deputies and authorities in 17 entities - it will be given amid a crisis of credibility in the national institutions, included the electoral ones, it recognized the magistrates of the Electoral Tribunal of the Judicial Power of the Federation (TEPJF) Flavio Galvan Rivera.  He also referred to the possibility that in Guerrero they cannot be carried out voting June 7 before the crisis that faces in that entity. In this respect he said that although the participation is little, “the election should be rescued". He affirmed that it is in hands of the citizenship to make that the electoral process is reliable. There is “a crisis in the institutions to national scale; obviously the TEPJF and the INE are included; it is a national situation that we are living. What do we make it? To trust and to participate in that makes. More than 10 million Mexicans they will be selected to integrate the directive tables of polling-booth; this is, almost one of each ten; let us complete, let us cooperate and let us be close". This crisis is not only due to the performance of the institutions, “but rather it is also for our culture of the distrust and incredulity. We need to educate to the citizenship, to children, youths and adults so that they learn how to believe in the institutions”.   If the citizens participate in the polling-booth and do they carry out their activities correctly, what do you doubt the citizens they can find? When referring to the possibility that in Guerrero the elections are boycotted or be not carried out, he underlined: "It is the risk of all democratic country; if there are not elections there are not authorities. If in that entity few vote we have to rescue a right system. We cannot allow that the elections are not carried out". Consultant of the INE, Arturo Sanchez asserts that one of the main challenges for the institute will be the inspection, and it is that the one surpasses in cat rock of political campaign expense or the use of resources of illicit origin they are reason of nullity of the election. With reference to their words, he mentioned the case of spots of the Green Party (PVEM) that has been admonishment object, because it is beyond if it is or not legal their transmission one has to know how much it has spent the party in these.     Millionaire expense in their electoral insole  The new electoral organism will spend in its labor personnel 526.2 million dollars, what represents 30 percent more than in 2009 -with the previous IFE -, another year of intermediate elections. According to a report of the internal expenses control bureau (personnel) it will be revised, because it is the main element of pressure and expense, and it constitutes the biggest obstacle to reduce the budget of the institute. Of each half dollar that the INE receives and this without considering the prerogatives of the political parties, six pennies are for salaries. Their budget is of 881 million dollars and it is not very worn-out, it indicates the annual report of administration of the expenses control bureau.  It is considered that problems already prevail detected by expenses control bureau (Deloitte bureau), as for labor personnel: there are duplicity of functions, undervaluation and overvaluation of positions, atomization of the salary tabulator and disparity in work loads, they lack catalogs of profiles for the occupation of positions and there are important breaches between budgetary and the personnel's occupation in projects, among others.     It is also recommended that, finished the elections, the positions of the institution are revised, because they accumulate the new ones that are generated in each electoral process. "In particular, it is of the biggest importance that, once concluded the (next) federal electoral process, the INE is given to the task of solving the serious operative problem (created in the IFE) that prevents to return the dimension from its occupational structure to the previous volume to the beginning of the process (…) since systematically accumulate some of the positions originally requested as even support the elections organization, perpetuating them in the fixed organic structure of the institution". It is recognized as a success that the INE made a first adjustment to its organizational structure in many years, when suppressing the Center for the Democratic Development in 2015.                With those antecedents, it is clear that the genesis of the institutional bad reputation to which made allusion FGR magistrate it comes behind from years and that the same witness has had in their a preponderant and even protagonist paper. Its acting in 2006 and 2012 is an example of the process of demolition of the electoral institutions undertaken from inside for its own officials, and yesterday's declarations constitutes, in that measure, a sample of cynicism: the legal order of the country establishes that the responsibility of to organize and to qualify reliable elections doesn't correspond to the citizenship, like Galvan seeks, but to the INE and the TEPJF, organs that consume astronomical budgets coming from the pocket of the causing ones and that, however, they have defrauded in reiterated form the trust of the society. (La Jornada, politica, p.p. 2-3, March 24, 2015).