From the cancellation of an international airport in Texcoco to the construction of the Dos Bocas refinery; from the dismantling of the daycare system to the million-dollar injections in favor of the state oil company Pemex. EL PAÍS journalist Isabella Cota (Monterrey, 42 years old) explains in her book ‘Luck or disaster. Chance as AMLO’s economic model’ the main contradictions of this Government in economic matters. The author contrasts the good sense that this central Administration has had in capitalizing on the favorable external winds of the nearshoring or the trade war between the US and China, with the lack of a fine-tuned vision to safeguard small and medium-sized businesses during the pandemic or to guarantee a quality education and health system. A panorama of light and dark, between record foreign investment and remittance figures, against the highest budget deficit in the last 30 years.
Ask. How did the project of writing this book begin?
AnswerThe publisher had this idea of making a book about AMLO’s economic management. This was in 2021 and it took two years of writing and working on it. My idea at the beginning was that there was no polished economic policy, but rather a series of decisions that were made by the Executive and that impacted the Mexican economy. With the arrival of foreign and private investment, what I proposed as the title of the book was the president’s luck because how lucky AMLO was that he had to capitalize on these factors and at this moment when the United States and China are in an intense trade fight where the main beneficiary is Mexico. But it is not only about the great luck of the president, but how he is going to deal with the structural problems that he leaves behind due to the decisions he has made.
P. Do you foresee a change in López Obrador’s economic policy during his six-year term?
R. I think there was a change in the Administration, but not a metamorphosis of AMLO. What I see is a president who came to power without a sophisticated, fine understanding of the economy, who had in mind emblematic projects that were going to be his legacy: the Mayan Train, the Dos Bocas refinery, the Interoceanic corridor, the AIFA, for example, and around that he made the other decisions, including social aid, because social aid is boosting consumption and family income but it is money that was no longer invested in education or health. I think it was external factors, the interest of foreign investors, the new Free Trade Agreement with the United States, which have generated certainty in large capitals, that was the metamorphosis.
P. Some of the specialists cited in your book speak of the president’s phobia of debt.
R. AMLO is not debt-phobic, but rather comes from a school of Mexican traumas from the seventies and eighties of hyperinflation, of the Fobaproa, and he thinks that the country should go into debt only if it benefits his party.
P. How can we position López Obrador in business, as a man of the left, of the center or of the right?
R. I don’t think he’s right or left. I think he makes decisions based on what he thinks will give him more power and that’s his ideology. Economically, the president doesn’t fit into any mold. I call him a closet neoliberal, because he says that the State has to have an important presence in the economy, but in the education sector, large American funds came and invested millions during his administration.
P. How do you think the business community perceives López Obrador at this point in his administration?
R. Businessmen are leaving this Administration a little worn out and fed up with the Mornings, of having the feeling that if one day the president decides to go against them, he will expose them in one way or another and attack them and there will be very little they can do to retake the narrative. I also believe that the business class in Mexico has failed the country as much as the political class.
P. What economic successes did this Government have?
R. He did not go against the financial system, López Obrador reacted at key moments that could have been worse, for example, when Morena wanted to pass this regulation that the Bank of Mexico had to be forced to buy surplus dollars, AMLO reacted and realized that it was a battle that was not worth fighting.
P. What will the next tenant of the National Palace find: luck or disaster?
R. They will find that tax collection is better than it was six years ago, but there is a very narrow margin for spending. If they do not start collecting more taxes from those who produce the most, they will not have the money to do all the things they want to do.
P. What will be López Obrador’s economic legacy?
RPeople will remember the López Obrador administration as the government under which their family income increased, that will be its legacy, whether or not it is AMLO’s right to hang that medal is a bit irrelevant. For me, the legacy will be that this administration was a huge missed opportunity because we are talking about a government that won the election with a lot of popularity, that declared itself leftist, a government that in the first three years could have passed a progressive tax reform and they didn’t. I think that the Latin American left lacks stories of victory and this could have been a great victory story and it wasn’t.
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