The Formula 1 Grand Prix auto race is on again in Mexico City after an agreement was reached for another three years that won’t require any additional investment by the government.
Mayor Claudia Shienbaum had said that the 800 million pesos (US $42 million) necessary to keep Mexico in the Formula 1 races over the next five years would go instead to the Maya Train project, although talks over alternative funding for the event continued.
After months of uncertainty, Sheinbaum announced with a Twitter video today that Formula 1 president Jean Todt will visit the capital tomorrow to sign an agreement ensuring the continuation of the auto races in Mexico City through 2022.
She said that a group of business owners had agreed to take on the financial responsibility, relieving the city government of the burden.
“I would like to let you know that this was made possible thanks to a group of entrepreneurs, because on this occasion the city [government] is not investing any public funds. This is good news for the city and for the country; [the races] bring tourism and economic benefits.”
According to statistics provided by the previous administration, the Grand Prix was the country’s most economically significant sporting event in 2017: that year, the race generated a total of 14.8 billion pesos (US $778.2 million) in economic spillover.
The results showed that readers feel somewhat safer than respondents to the first survey – 57% said they felt unsafe traveling on the nation’s highways, while 32% said they didn’t. Another 10% of respondents were undecided.
In the poll’s comments section, some readers elaborated on their experiences driving on Mexico’s roads and/or shared their advice: Here’s what they said (responses lightly edited for clarity).
“If the federales don’t hit you up for bribes at a roadblock, the bandits might,” wrote Ken Terrill before warning motorists to not travel on Mexico’s highways at night “under any circumstances.”
Similarly, Brock Huffman, an American who operates a birdwatching company in Chiapas, said that he never travels at night and tries to avoid secondary roads.
He also said he checks in with contacts in towns toward which he is traveling in order to be informed of any imminent dangers.
“So far, we have had no problems in the nine years we have been in business,” Huffman wrote.
Diego Valdez said that he has traveled all over Mexico for 40 years and never had a bad experience.
“However, I always use common sense like not driving at night or on secondary roads. I am aware that crime and corruption have increased dramatically and thus I also increase my caution. I am hopeful that the new National Guard will . . . reduce crime and violence,” he wrote.
Doug H. said that he has traveled over 200,000 kilometers on motorcycle through 28 Mexican states using mainly secondary roads over the past 20 years and “only ever had a few bad experiences, a couple of times in Mexico City and in Cuernavaca.”
“. . . The highways are safe if you drive sensibly,” he wrote.
Major highways seen as safer than secondary ones.
Other readers were more forthcoming in describing the negative experiences they or their family members have had on Mexico’s highways.
“Our niece and her husband were carjacked at 9:30am on a highway in Puebla,” wrote a reader who identified himself only as Eric.
“Thank God only their car and jewelry were taken, not their lives . . .” he added.
“After many vacations in Mexico without incident day or night, other than twice being rousted by local cops, my wife and I retired to Mexico three years ago. We have learned, however, to adhere to unwritten rules about traveling on highways and toll roads during the day only . . .”
A reader who identified himself as George recalled being in “bumper-to-bumper traffic” in Nuevo Laredo while heading for Texas when he was pulled over for “speeding” and issued an on-the-spot fine for 1,500 pesos.
“That worked out to 500 pesos each for the three transit cops so they could soon head to the cantina and have a good time,” he wrote tongue-in-cheek.
Richard Roussin said he feels unsafe on Mexico’s highways “because our country is blatantly being robbed by caseta [toll booth] owners.”
“. . . I’ve been robbed repeatedly . . . while trying to pay for my one-axle trailer and being forced to pay as a two-axle trailer. Thieves with a permission to abuse,” he wrote.
Finally, an almost decade-long resident of Mexico charged that “one of the stupidest things a gringo can do is drive through anywhere in Guerrero or Michoacán at night in an expensive car.”
“Also, I’ve learned that you must stop at any kind of roadblock and be ready with a smile . . . as you hand over 20 pesos if they are not police or military. Twenty pesos . . . is cheap security when traveling through any part of Mexico . . . The safest thing any gringo can do . . . is look very poor and humble, not rich and arrogant . . .” Rusty Hill wrote.
Ernesto 'N' is believed to be a crime gang leader in Playa del Carmen.
A joint operation by the National Guard and Quintana Roo police has led to the arrest of the suspected leader of the Playa del Carmen cell of the Los Pelones crime gang.
Ernesto “N,” also known as “El Pantera” (The Panther), was detained at 11:00pm Monday on Azulejos avenue in Playa del Carmen, Quintana Roo Public Security Secretary Alberto Capella told a press conference.
The 43-year-old native of Acapulco, Guerrero, was armed at the time of his arrest and in possession of drugs, Capella said.
The vehicle in which he was traveling was seized and an 18-year-old woman with him was also taken into custody.
Capella said the arrest is a significant blow to organized crime, explaining that “El Pantera” has been identified by both federal and state authorities as the principal instigator of homicides and extortion in Playa del Carmen, Puerto Morelos and Tulum.
The eight most wanted in Playa del Carmen. Recognize anyone? Call 911, police ask.
The security chief also presented images of eight suspects with links to organized crime who are believed to be involved in a range of criminal activities in the municipality of Solidaridad (Playa del Carmen), including homicides, extortion and drug trafficking.
Capella urged the public to report their location to authorities should they see any of the eight men, one of whom is the brother and alleged right-hand man of Ernesto “N.”
“The party is over for these guys,” Capella declared.
Capella said the takeover coincided with the launch of “Operation Solidaridad,” which will aim to improve security across the municipality with special attention to the high-crime neighborhoods of Villas del Sol, Centro, Luis Donaldo Colosio, Misión del Carmen and Misión de las Flores.
According to elcri.men, a crime monitoring website, Solidaridad was the 11th most violent municipality in Mexico in the first half of the year.
Capella said that there were 135 homicides in Solidaridad to the end of July but expressed confidence that authorities will be able to reduce the murder rate by year’s end.
He charged that the crime and violence problem in Playa del Carmen was “inherited” from past municipal and state governments that allowed local, national and international crime groups to operate with total impunity.
Since state police assumed security responsibility for the resort city under Quintana Roo’s single command policing system, several suspected members of criminal groups have been arrested.
Six thieves made off with a haul of tens of millions of pesos worth of commemorative coins and watches in a broad daylight robbery of the Mexican mint in downtown Mexico City on Tuesday morning.
It started at 9:30am when at least three armed men separately entered the mint, located just blocks from the Angel of Independence on Reforma avenue. Two of the robbers, who were dressed as office workers in dress shirts and sweaters, subdued and disarmed a 35-year-old guard. Meanwhile, the other robber went to the vault, which was already open, and began to fill a backpack with commemorative coins and watches.
Five minutes after they had entered the building, the three calmly walked out to meet their accomplices who were waiting with getaway vehicles on Reforma.
Mint employees activated security alarms at 9:35am. Mexico City police arrived to interview witnesses but were unable to catch the thieves before they fled.
An inventory check after the robbery showed that the thieves had stolen 1,567 commemorative coins as well as an unknown number of watches, with a total value of around 55 million pesos (US $2.8 million).
According to preliminary investigations by police, mint employees did not follow security protocols during the robbery. Police Chief Jesús Orta said that one line of investigation is focusing on the failure of the protocols, and that a guard and eight other employees are being investigated.
“It’s curious the way they went directly to the vault, and that they so easily removed the coins and watches,” he said.
This is the second time that the mint has been robbed in recent years. On July 17, 2018, four people beat guards and broke glass cases during a robbery that netted 10 million pesos worth of coins and watches.
There’s no end to recipes for Mexican salsa, and there are endless varieties of chiles with which to make it. But most of the chiles used in Mexico come from China.
According to the World Wildlife Foundation (WWF), 60% of green chiles consumed in Mexico are imported from China; the remainder are produced domestically.
On Monday, the WWF announced the start of the “Dale Chamba” campaign, which will promote the conservation of more than 1,500 varieties of green chile that are fundamental to Mexican cuisine, but have been in decline because of climate change and dependence on imports.
Silvia Cursain, a chef and gastronomy school teacher, told the news agency Efe that the quality of chiles depends not only on the variety, but where they are grown.
“If they don’t get the same nutrients, when you move them, the fruit changes,” she said. “Like how the dried serrano chiles that come from China, they don’t have flavor or aroma.”
Jorge Rickards, director of WWF México, said that diverse chile varieties are an important part of Mexican culture.
“We have a cultural wealth of over 350 languages, 350 sources of traditional knowledge that are translated into cuisines,” he said. “There are more than 1,500 species that still form part of the ingredients of the traditional diets in Mexico.”
Rickards said that “fast food diets” have put traditional crops like heirloom tomatoes, pumpkin seeds, ayocote and vaquita beans at risk, as well as chiles like chilhuacle, pasilla mixe and poblano.
Chef Ricardo Muñoz Zurita said the decline in traditional Mexican products is also related to the fact that they are mostly consumed in certain regions, because of a lack of knowledge of how to use them.
“In local markets in Oaxaca or Yucatán, we see certain products as strange,” he said. “We think that they have been brought from other places, and because we don’t know what they are, we don’t use them. We should revalue and rediscover our traditional cooking, our historical cooking, based on the foundation of corn.”
Some rail cars are ready but the line won't be completed until next year.
The federal government has coughed up funds to resume work on the Mexico City-Toluca passenger train, a project left unfinished and over-budget by the Enrique Peña Nieto administration.
Communications and Transportation Secretary Javier Jiménez Espriú announced the allocation of 500 million pesos (US $25.5 million) toward completion of the second phase of the project, which includes a railroad network stretching from the Metro Observatorio station to the business district of Santa Fe.
In the meantime, Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum announced that the federal government would shoulder all remaining costs of the work.
On June 13, the two officials signed an agreement that went into effect today to resume work on the project within 15 days and that the second phase will be completed no later than December 31 of this year.
They also agreed that weekly advances in the progress of construction and the use of the funds will be provided in a weekly report to overseeing authorities and the Mexico City comptroller’s office. Additionally, the two capped the amount of federal funds permitted to be spent on the project’s administrative costs at 1%.
In his Monday press conference, President López Obrador reaffirmed his promise that the train will be completed in 2020. He added that the federal government will need to spend an additional 30 billion pesos on the project.
“We cannot just abandon this project because, as I have been saying, it has meant an investment and spending from the federal budget, which is the people’s money.”
The 57-kilometer railway, which is expected to cut commute time between Mexico City and Toluca to just 39 minutes, has been delayed by protests, construction problems and legal problems. It was originally scheduled to be completed by December 2017.
CNTE members strike a few blows for education at a Oaxaca protest in 2015.
The Oaxaca local of the CNTE teachers’ union has taken advantage of the repeal of the previous government’s educational reform to once again take control of the allocation of teaching positions in the state.
The union is also in charge of teacher transfers and promotions in the southern state for the first since the 2013 educational reform was implemented, according to a report published today in the newspaper El Universal.
As before, participation in union protests is a key requirement if teachers wish to advance.
In order to be appointed to a new position or to be considered for transfer or promotion, the CNTE has announced that teachers must prove that they have participated in 80% of protests, blockades, marches and other union activities.
It also said that teachers who belong or have belonged to the dominant SNTE teachers’ union or other rival groups, or who were appointed or promoted while the previous government’s educational reform was in effect, will not be allowed to apply for appointment, transfer or promotion.
Teachers block a highway with hijacked buses in a 2015 protest in Oaxaca.
Section 22 spokesman Wilbert Santiago Valdivieso said that teachers need to show evidence of their participation in CNTE activities in order to prove their loyalty to the union.
“Here in Oaxaca we have the spurious [section] 59 [of the SNTE] and SITEM [the Independent Union of Education Workers] . . . I can’t give an application to a comrade who is corrupt . . . who’s in the group of [former SNTE boss] Elba Esther Gordillo or to one who supported the imposition of the educational reform . . .” he said.
“Proof of [CNTE] union participation is ratification of the affiliation of colleagues.”
The CNTE – especially locals in southern states – vehemently opposed the educational reformed implemented by the government of former president Enrique Peña Nieto, and organized countless protests against it.
The current government’s education reform was declared constitutional in May, bringing to an end all provisions in the previous administration’s general teaching service law including controversial teacher evaluations.
Landowners march to press for payment of what they claim is owed.
The much-needed expansion of the Guadalajara airport continues to be held up by a long-running dispute over the payment of compensation for expropriated land.
The federal government expropriated 307 hectares for the airport in 1951 but almost 70 years later, community landowners of the El Zapote ejido (cooperative) say that full and fair compensation still hasn’t been paid.
To meet growing demand for passenger and freight services, the Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla International Airport needs another runway and other facilities that are slated to be built on 137 hectares of land also owned by the El Zapote ejido.
However, landowners are refusing to cede the land until they are compensated for the 1951 expropriation.
Ejido representative Nicolás Vega Pedroza told the newspaper El Economista that it is time for the government to pay up.
“. . . There is already an appraisal [of the value of the land], everything is ready, there are no more recourses other than to pay the ejido. This week we have a visit to Mexico City and we’re going to see what progress there is with the Secretariat of Communications and Transportation . . .” he said.
Based on an appraisal for which they paid, the landowners have demanded 3.2 billion pesos (US $163.5 million) in compensation but a government appraiser valued the land at less than half that amount.
“The last appraisal that came out is for 1.317 billion pesos [US $67.3 million]. We didn’t agree with how they did it, because of the methodology, but if we reach an agreement and they pay us, we’ll be satisfied with that,” Vega said.
“There are 137 hectares they [want to] use, 51 [hectares] immediately for the second runway and the rest for workshops and other things. The ejido has no problem in reaching an agreement, negotiating, but up to now they haven’t paid us.”
The president of the Guadalajara chapter of the American Chamber of Commerce said that resolving the dispute is a matter of urgency, adding that with the expansion of the airport the region encompassing Jalisco and surrounding states has the potential to become Mexico’s logistics hub.
“There is already a promise from President Andrés Manuel López Obrador for a second runway, to reach agreements with the ejido . . . We’re seeking for that to be achieved so that we have an airport that is a hub, especially for freight,” Francisco Wilson Loaiza said.
The Senate is tightening security but without inviting tenders and with a lack of transparency, the newspaper El Financiero reported.
The Senate’s administrative director has arranged to purchase security cameras for the legislature from a company without an invitation for tenders.
Mauricio Farah Gebara said he awarded contracts worth 134 million pesos (US $6.8 million) to Grupo IDSEC without a public invitation for tenders for security reasons, citing the urgent need to protect the “the integrity of goods and persons” within the Senate chambers and the Chamber of Deputies.
The contract for the installation of 600 security cameras in the Senate was awarded directly to the company and signed on June 1. Under the conditions of the contract, the company will provide service for five years, for which the senate paid a 30% advance.
The signing of a contract may have been hastened after a parcel bomb exploded in Senator Citlalli Hernández’s office on May 29. After the attack, Ricardo Monreal, president of the committee for political coordination, called for increased security measures within the legislature.
In both cases, Gebara insisted that he had the right to directly award the contract without tenders because of the urgent need to improve security in the legislature. But El Financiero said he has maintained “an opaque relationship” with the supplier.
In the last two years, Gebara has signed contracts without tenders worth 134.68 million pesos to the same company.
Fear and uncertainty about the policy agenda of President López Obrador are paralyzing investment, according to high-ranking business executives who spoke to the news agency Bloomberg.
A report published today said that about half a dozen executives who met with Bloomberg in Mexico City last week described navigating the president’s policies and abrupt pronouncements as a struggle.
The most common word that the executives used to describe López Obrador’s decision-making process on issues that affect them was “erratic,” Bloomberg said.
Speaking on the condition of anonymity, most expressed support for the government’s implementation of austerity measures and its crusade against corruption – many said that the scourge spiraled out of control during Enrique Peña Nieto’s presidency – but rejected the decisions to cancel the Texcoco airport project, freeze new energy auctions and take legal action that seeks to annul clauses in natural gas pipelines.
Amid uncertainty about what the president might do next, the executives said they closely watch López Obrador’s daily press conferences for clues.
In that context, no one is investing, they said. Many of the executives said they see the beginning of a downward economic trend for Mexico although their views differed about how steep the slope will be.
In any case, the situation raises a range of questions, Bloomberg said: “Invest now? Wait to invest? Simply keep the business on autopilot or consider selling assets? Put resources toward other countries?”
Gross fixed investment in Mexico fell 7.4% in May, the worst monthly performance in more than two years, while the economy only narrowly avoided entering a technical recession by recording 0.1% growth between April and June after a 0.2% contraction in the first quarter.
The International Monetary Fund slashed its growth outlook for the Mexican economy to 0.9% from 1.6% last month while the Bank of America and Citibanamex cut their forecasts to just 0.5% and 0.2%, respectively.
Bloomberg said that the “mix of AMLO’s austerity drive and the uncertainty among business leaders” is taking a heavy toll on the economy.
The news agency noted that while the president is curtailing government spending in many areas, he has allocated significant funding to Pemex, the beleaguered state oil company.
It questioned the logic of building a new oil refinery on the Tabasco coast when existing refineries are operating at or below 30% capacity.
Considering the president’s track record on canceling and challenging investment projects, Bloomberg said the business community is waiting for “a sign – any sign” that López Obrador can generate an economic and legal environment in which investors have the confidence they need to make decisions.
The news agency noted that the president told its editor-in-chief John Micklethwait in an interview last week that he respects contracts and the need for foreign investment but added that “for the executives, actions speak louder than words.”
