President López Obrador claimed today that legal opposition to the Santa Lucía airport is politically motivated, asserting that opponents of his government “don’t want the transformation” he is bringing to Mexico.
“They want us to look bad . . . for the airport not to be built,” López Obrador told reporters at his morning press conference.
The president said that “there is no reason” for the opposition, pointing out that the site where the airport will be built has been used as an air force base for 60 years.
The only motivation is “political,” López Obrador charged.
The president reiterated his claim that the injunction requests against the airport filed by the #NoMásDerroches (No More Waste) Collective – a group made up of civil society organizations, law firms and more than 100 citizens – amount to “legal sabotage.”
“All the lawyers of conservatism” are involved in the legal action, López Obrador said, implying that they were supporters of the past “neoliberal” governments against which he frequently rails.
“Even the association of Claudio X. González, who has always had differences with us,” is supporting the legal action, the president said in reference to Mexicans Against Corruption and Impunity, one of the #NoMásDerroches members.
“. . . Mr. Claudio X. González . . . was an advisor to [former president Carlos] Salinas and a promoter of the policies of privatization,” López Obrador added.
The collective has already been granted several injunctions against the Santa Lucía project including one issued by a judge yesterday that overruled the environmental authorization granted by the Environment Secretariat in July.
A lawyer for the collective said in June that reviving the abandoned Mexico City airport project at Texcoco is “legally possible.”
López Obrador today acknowledged that as many as 147 separate injunction requests have been filed against the Santa Lucía airport but expressed confidence that the government will be able to overcome them.
The president said that when he was mayor of Mexico City his government faced legal opposition against the plan to build the elevated road network known as the Segundo Piso, explaining that the main injunction was filed by “a great lawyer, an outstanding lawyer” but was nevertheless defeated.
Now, he charged, “there might be a lot of injunctions but the lawyers aren’t so good.”
The president doubled down on his decision to cancel the previous government’s airport project at Texcoco, asserting that its completion would cost much more than the estimated 300 billion pesos (US $15 billion).
López Obrador scrapped the project after a legally questionable public consultation.
“The criminal association between the economic power and political power is over. The government is for everyone, not for a faction, that’s the change . . .” he said today.
“. . . We’re not going to give in, we’re going to continue to confront all this questioning without losing our heads, without authoritarian acts, respecting the judicial power, enforcing the rule of law . . . There’s no need to get angry. We’re happy, happy, happy, relaxed, relaxed, relaxed.”
Source: Reforma (sp)
