Politics

Mexico president poised for election win, fired by statist energy drive

Published

3 years ago

June 2, 2021

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s drive to strengthen state control of natural resources faces a key test on Sunday at mid-term elections that will determine control of Congress for the rest of his administration.

The leftist Lopez Obrador has upset many of Mexico‘s main trade partners and leading business groups by pushing through legislation to reverse the previous government’s opening of the energy market to more private capital.

Though that has sapped investment, his argument that he is fighting for Mexico’s poor against unscrupulous elites still resonates with voters, making his National Regeneration Movement (MORENA) heavily favored to retain the lower house of Congress.

“Mexico’s a rich country, but we’ve allowed other people to come and take our riches from us,” said Cesar Lopez, a 42-year-old MORENA supporter in the northern city of Hermosillo who is firmly behind the president’s energy agenda.

Though voters tend to criticize this government’s record on job creation and fighting crime, they are more skeptical of Mexico’s former rulers, now in opposition. Lopez Obrador has also benefited from the vaccine rollout against COVID-19.

Opinion polls suggest MORENA may lose a few seats in the lower house, which controls the budget. But it should comfortably reach a majority with the help of political allies.

If it beats expectations, the alliance could even get a two-thirds majority allowing Lopez Obrador to pursue constitutional changes to back his statist vision in the second half of his six-year term. That prospect worries some investors.

He is barred from seeking re-election by law.

The president has put taking control of energy policy at the center of his economic agenda, arguing that past governments prioritized private interests at the public’s expense.

That ambition has been cramped by a 2013-14 constitutional energy reform by his predecessor Enrique Pena Nieto, and many of MORENA’s legislative changes have been frozen by lower courts.

His answer has been: see you at the Supreme Court.

Supreme Court rulings are still pending on Lopez Obrador’s moves to give precedence over private interests to national power utility the Comision Federal de Electricidad (CFE) and its oil and gas counterpart, Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex).

Pressuring the court to side with him, he has threatened to change the constitution if it does not.

Such a step could exacerbate disputes with allies by breaching Mexico’s commitments under the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement trade deal, business groups say.

Lopez Obrador’s taste for using referendums to cancel infrastructure projects he opposes has further unsettled investors.

He has also sparred with mining companies, criticizing how many concessions were granted them by past governments.

Still, Lopez Obrador on Wednesday hinted he did not envisage many major legal changes in what remained of his term, saying the “constitutional reforms are pretty much done.” Only very few remained, he added, without going into detail.

SELF-INTEREST

Lopez Obrador took office in December 2018 pledging to improve growth and reduce violent crime. Instead, the economy has shrunk for the past two years – contracting 8.5% in 2020 – and homicides have reached unprecedented levels.

Neil Herrington, senior vice president for the Americas at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said it was in Mexico’s interest to create certainty for business and lift the economy.

An important signal towards restoring confidence would be for Mexico to walk back energy policies designed to tilt the playing field in favor of state-run firms, Herrington noted.

“U.S. investors across all industries are watching Mexico’s actions on energy closely because they’re convinced the outcome of the sector’s current challenges will have a major impact on the country’s broader economy and investment climate,” he said.

Lopez Obrador argues that billions of dollars in power industry contracts awarded by predecessors ripped off taxpayers, and he wants companies to agree new terms more favorable to the state.

A few companies are believed to be pursuing international arbitration. But unless firms sell up, analysts expect most to reach some sort of deal with Lopez Obrador – just as natural gas pipeline operators did in 2019 during a similar renegotiation.

Mexico’s economic fortunes in 2021 have been buoyed by U.S. stimulus spending under President Joe Biden, fueling demand for Mexican goods. Some 80% of Mexico’s exports go to the United States, and exports are at record levels. Mexico’s government says the economy could grow 6.5% this year.

Businesses have flagged concerns about Lopez Obrador’s policies to Washington, but the focus of bilateral relations has been keeping a lid on illegal immigration.

U.S. reliance on Mexico to help stem migrant flows gives Lopez Obrador more latitude to pursue an independent economic agenda, Mexican officials say privately.

The president has wrapped his economic vision in a narrative that business, political and media elites connived to hog Mexico’s riches, fueling poverty, inequality and violence.

Lopez Obrador is right to want to solve those problems, but his rhetoric is stoking serious division, argued Andres Rozental, a former Mexican deputy foreign minister.

“This polarization,” he said, “is extremely damaging and worrisome for a country that needs to get its people together to get out of the rut that it’s in.”

(Reporting by Dave Graham; Additional reporting by Ana Isabel Martinez; Editing by Alistair Bell)

Politics

Anita Anand sworn in as transport minister after Pablo Rodriguez resigns

Published

17 hours ago

September 19, 2024

Anne Joseph

OTTAWA – Treasury Board President Anita Anand has been sworn in as federal transport minister at a ceremony at Rideau Hall, taking over a portfolio left vacant after Pablo Rodriguez resigned from cabinet and the Liberal caucus on Thursday.

Anand thanked Rodriguez for his contributions to the government and the country, saying she’s grateful for his guidance and friendship.

She sidestepped a question about the message it sends to have him leave the federal Liberal fold.

“That is a decision that he made independently, and I wish him well,” she said.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was not present for the swearing-in ceremony, nor were any other members of the Liberal government.

The shakeup in cabinet comes just days after the Liberals lost a key seat in a Montreal byelection to the Bloc Québécois and amid renewed calls for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to step down and make way for a new leader.

Anand said she is not actively seeking leadership of the party, saying she is focused on her roles as minister and as MP.

“My view is that we are a team, and we are a team that has to keep delivering for our country,” she said.

The minority Liberal government is in a more challenging position in the House of Commons after the NDP ended a supply-and-confidence deal that provided parliamentary stability for more than two years.

Non-confidence votes are guaranteed to come from the Opposition Conservatives, who are eager to bring the government down.

On Thursday morning, Rodriguez made a symbolic walk over the Alexandra Bridge from Parliament Hill to Gatineau, Que., where he formally announced his plans to run for the Quebec Liberal party leadership.

He said he will now sit as an Independent member of Parliament, which will allow him to focus on his own priorities.

“I was defending the priorities of the government, and I did it in a very loyal way,” he said.

“It’s normal and it’s what I had to do. But now it’s more about my vision, the vision of the team that I’m building.”

Rodriguez said he will stay on as an MP until the Quebec Liberal leadership campaign officially launches in January.

He said that will “avoid a costly byelection a few weeks, or months, before a general election.”

The next federal election must be held by October 2025.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said he will try to topple the government sooner than that, beginning with a non-confidence motion that is set to be debated Sept. 24 and voted on Sept. 25.

Poilievre has called on the NDP and the Bloc Québécois to support him, but both Jagmeet Singh and Yves-François Blanchet have said they will not support the Conservatives.

Rodriguez said he doesn’t want a federal election right away and will vote against the non-confidence motion.

As for how he would vote on other matters before the House of Commons, “it would depend on the votes.”

Public Services and Procurement Minister Jean-Yves Duclos will become the government’s new Quebec lieutenant, a non-cabinet role Rodriguez held since 2019.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.

— With files from Nojoud Al Mallees and Dylan Robertson

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Politics

Political parties cool to idea of new federal regulations for nomination contests

Published

17 hours ago

September 19, 2024

Anne Joseph

OTTAWA – Several federal political parties are expressing reservations about the prospect of fresh regulations to prevent foreign meddlers from tainting their candidate nomination processes.

Elections Canada has suggested possible changes to safeguard nominations, including barring non-citizens from helping choose candidates, requiring parties to publish contest rules and explicitly outlawing behaviour such as voting more than once.

However, representatives of the Bloc Québécois, Green Party and NDP have told a federal commission of inquiry into foreign interference that such changes may be unwelcome, difficult to implement or counterproductive.

The Canada Elections Act currently provides for limited regulation of federal nomination races and contestants.

For instance, only contestants who accept $1,000 in contributions or incur $1,000 in expenses have to file a financial return. In addition, the act does not include specific obligations concerning candidacy, voting, counting or results reporting other than the identity of the successful nominee.

A report released in June by the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians expressed concern about how easily foreign actors can take advantage of loopholes and vulnerabilities to support preferred candidates.

Lucy Watson, national director of the NDP, told the inquiry Thursday she had concerns about the way in which new legislation would interact with the internal decision-making of the party.

“We are very proud of the fact that our members play such a significant role in shaping the internal policies and procedures and infrastructure of the party, and I would not want to see that lost,” she said.

“There are guidelines, there are best practices that we would welcome, but if we were to talk about legal requirements and legislation, that’s something I would have to take away and put further thought into, and have discussions with folks who are integral to the party’s governance.”

In an August interview with the commission of inquiry, Bloc Québécois executive director Mathieu Desquilbet said the party would be opposed to any external body monitoring nomination and leadership contest rules.

A summary tabled Thursday says Desquilbet expressed doubts about the appropriateness of requiring nomination candidates to file a full financial report with Elections Canada, saying the agency’s existing regulatory framework and the Bloc’s internal rules on the matter are sufficient.

Green Party representatives Jon Irwin and Robin Marty told the inquiry in an August interview it would not be realistic for an external body, like Elections Canada, to administer nomination or leadership contests as the resources required would exceed the federal agency’s capacity.

A summary of the interview says Irwin and Marty “also did not believe that rules violations could effectively be investigated by an external body like the Office of the Commissioner of Canada Elections.”

“The types of complaints that get raised during nomination contests can be highly personal, politically driven, and could overwhelm an external body.”

Marty, national campaign director for the party, told the inquiry Thursday that more reporting requirements would also place an administrative burden on volunteers and riding workers.

In addition, he said that disclosing the vote tally of a nomination contest could actually help foreign meddlers by flagging the precise number of ballots needed for a candidate to be chosen.

Irwin, interim executive director of the Greens, said the ideal tactic for a foreign country would be working to get someone in a “position of power” within a Canadian political party.

He said “the bad guys are always a step ahead” when it comes to meddling in the Canadian political process.

In May, David Vigneault, director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service at the time, said it was very clear from the design of popular social media app TikTok that data gleaned from its users is available to the Chinese government.

A December 2022 CSIS memo tabled at the inquiry Thursday said TikTok “has the potential to be exploited” by Beijing to “bolster its influence and power overseas, including in Canada.”

Asked about the app, Marty told the inquiry the Greens would benefit from more “direction and guidance,” given the party’s lack of resources to address such things.

Representatives of the Liberal and Conservative parties are slated to appear at the inquiry Friday, while chief electoral officer Stéphane Perrault is to testify at a later date.

After her party representatives appeared Thursday, Green Leader Elizabeth May told reporters it was important for all party leaders to work together to come up with acceptable rules.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.

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Politics

New Brunswick election candidate profile: Green Party Leader David Coon

Published

20 hours ago

September 19, 2024

Anne Joseph

FREDERICTON – A look at David Coon, leader of the Green Party of New Brunswick:

Born: Oct. 28, 1956.

Early years: Born in Toronto and raised in Montreal, he spent about three decades as an environmental advocate.

Education: A trained biologist, he graduated with a bachelor of science from McGill University in Montreal in 1978.

Family: He and his wife Janice Harvey have two daughters, Caroline and Laura.

Before politics: Worked as an environmental educator, organizer, activist and manager for 33 years, mainly with the Conservation Council of New Brunswick.

Politics: Joined the Green Party of Canada in May 2006 and was elected leader of the New Brunswick Green Party in September 2012. Won a seat in the legislature in 2014 — a first for the province’s Greens.

Quote: “It was despicable. He’s clearly decided to take the low road in this campaign, to adopt some Trump-lite fearmongering.” — David Coon on Sept. 12, 2024, reacting to Blaine Higgs’s claim that the federal government had decided to send 4,600 asylum seekers to New Brunswick.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 19, 2024.

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