“Do you want to be a senator? Look for the popular vote”
Claudia Sheinbaum presented her electoral reform proposal with two central axes: goodbye to multi-member lists and scissors to the spending of the National Electoral Institute. The premise is simple, according to her: that no one reaches Congress without having worked hard in the territory.
“I was always against the lists,” stated the president.
Their argument is that this figure allows the party leaders to appoint their friends without going through the polls. Something that, he says, citizens have rejected in consultations. But be careful, clarify that we are not looking for a single party, but rather to maintain plurality.
The details of the change
For the Chamber of Deputies, the 500 seats would be maintained. The key is that the 200 proportional representation would no longer be a blank check for the parties. Half would go to the best losers – high-voting candidates who did not win their district – and the other through directly voted short lists, with only two names per option.
For the Senate, the change is more radical: the proportional representation list is completely eliminated. Only the two majority senators and the first minority senator remain per state. Spot.
Sheinbaum even recalled that she herself refused to be nominated in that way in 2009 and 2012. I don’t criticize those who did it, she says, but the rules must change.
The other front: the INE pocket
The second major axis is a 25% cut to the ordinary spending of the INE and the political parties. We are talking about 12 thousand to 13 billion pesos. Imagine what it would mean for Tlaxcala, Campeche, Baja California Sur, he exemplified.
“The INE advisors continue to earn more than the president,” he said.
The idea is not to reduce the number of directors (they would remain at 11), but to eliminate bonuses, bonuses and benefits that are not necessary. In addition, it promises greater coordination with the FIU and the Treasury to freeze resources of illicit origin immediately, not months later.
The ball is now in Congress. Sheinbaum will send the initiative and it will be the legislators – many of whom came precisely because of those lists that now want to be eliminated – who will have the final say. The irony couldn’t be more perfect.
