Profession condemns Mexico president's 'gangsters' attack on judges

Representatives of the global legal profession have hit back at ‘egregious’ statements about the judiciary by the president of Mexico.

President López Obrador accused the Mexican federal judiciary of being ‘completely distorted’ and ‘impacted by corruption’, with a tendency to protect the elite and not the people, at a press conference in March.

He also compared judges with 10 or more years of seniority to ‘gangsters’. He later described the country's Supreme Court as part of the ‘mafia of power’ and that its ‘only god is money’, when condemning its decision to suspend part of a controversial reform pushed by the president.

Almudena Arpón de Mendívil Aldama, president of the International Bar Association, said in a statement that López Obrador had made ‘egregious and repeated remarks undermining the integrity of the country’s supreme court’.

She said: ‘These allegations fit into a broader context of criticism by the Mexican president on the integrity of the judiciary, targeting especially the country’s Supreme Court.’

One of the reforms being pushed by López Obrador would place constraints on the work of the independent election authority; another was a plan to transfer the control of the civilian-led National Guard to the army, which the Supreme Court labelled unconstitutional.

Arpón de Mendívil said the IBA was also concerned about the proposed reforms. The attempted reform to the election authority would slash its budget in a way that would significantly weaken its ability to organise and oversee elections. The increased role that López Obrador wants to grant the military in Mexico’s public life ‘is similarly troubling’.

‘Such reforms, if passed, coupled with other manoeuvres to re-centralise power and militarise the country, would determine a democratic backsliding for Mexico’, Arpón de Mendívil added. 

‘The IBA urges President López Obrador to respect the independence and integrity of Mexico’s judiciary in a manner consistent with the rule of law and Mexico’s international obligations.’