Purity

May 25, 2025

Luis Rubio

The problem with purity is that, as with so many other virtues, it is not easy to find it in the earthly kingdom. Morena, like all political parties and human organizations, is susceptible to the vicissitudes that present themselves in life, in the government, in politics and in the responsibility deriving from all of this. It is impossible to evade the passions and circumstances that form an inexorable part of the exercise of power, such as corruption, abuse, arbitrariness, fragmentation and violence. Years in power have made it impossible to expect purity where there simply is none.

Although Morena’s self-image is one of purity, its reality is not distinct from that of its predecessors once in action. The balancing acts its members engage in to purify cases of evident corruption, abuse of power and the commission of crimes, betray instead of ennobling them. And, evidently, Morena is not the only political party to have undergone such a transformation. The National Action Party (PAN) came into being as a reaction to the depravations and excesses of the then governing party (1939) and always presented itself as a modern, institutional, professional and pure alternative, free of all the conflicts of interest associated with the exercise of power. However, once in the government, PAN ended up seduced by all the practices that it had exposed and despised.

Morena finds itself in its second government and is no longer able to rely on the privilege of blaming the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) or the PAN of the evils it confronts. The happenings in Teuchitlán this year (and surely in innumerable other localities, all these during the reign of Morena) constitute irrefutable proof that the quality of its governance has not been exceptional and that the party will be made accountable as did its predecessors. While it has been eliminating or neutralizing the formal mechanisms conceived for such an effect, the informal mechanisms (and the vote) continue to be effective, as occurred so many times throughout the last century.

The responses of the current government to the finding of an extermination center have been a mixture of attempts to evade responsibility, recurring to the old trick of accusing the state government (obviously of another party), together with the dread of succumbing to the dynamic that destroyed the PRI of President Peña Nieto in Atoyzinapa in 2014. The result has been an absolute irresponsibility that does not fool anyone. Rather than taking advantage of the circumstance to build a new stage of political development -beginning with recognizing that the country is in effect facing a catastrophe in matters of security and violence- it has chosen to avoid reality (once again) trusting that the citizenry, in its capacity as electorate, will forgive it everything.

Unfortunately for the government and its quasi-hegemonic political party, it is highly probable that new evidence will surface of the abysmal quality of government, which was that of AMLO. Instead of concentrating on governing (which one would suppose as the raison d’être of a president elected for that purpose) the past administration devoted itself to one thing and one thing only: to erect a voter base that would allow it to win the following presidential election and stay in power through a surrogate person. Governing was so easy, AMLO claimed, that it was not necessary to do it, except that unseen-to problems start to pile up and, sooner or later, like those now at the ranches of Jalisco or the street Tlalpan, in addition to those that accumulate this week, erupt with all of the fury that they merit. The consequences of what has not been done are never long in appearing and a government emanating from that, and that specifies itself as not being different, has no way out; it ends up, as the popular expression goes, paying the piper.

Is there an alternative? Of course: there always is. But this would imply launching into governing and governing entails attending to the problems that are natural to the life of a society, exacerbated by all the blights, errors and derelictions of the AMLO administration and of all the previous ones. This would imply desisting from building castles in the air, distracting narratives that, however attractive they might be for a part of the citizenry, are not conducive to the development of or to sustaining the legitimacy of the government.

In circumstances like the current ones, popularity, without ceasing to be real, is not guaranteed because it is not something static, howsoever much it is sustained by governmental “supports” (i.e. cash transfers) and, therefore, still in the dawning of this administration, constitutes an exceedingly rash wager. In addition, the problem for Morena is that, however much they try to deny or ignore it, the enemy lies within and purity simply does not exist.

Mexico requires a government dedicated to building the future, for which at least three conditions are necessary: security, infrastructure and conditions for development. It is evident that the government understands the importance of security, but it can solely count on enfeebled instruments for the purpose. The infrastructure, physical, but especially education and health, is pathetic and does not show up on the governmental radar, but without it no distinct future is possible. Regarding the conditions for development, in addition to the two prior ones, the impediments are much more political and ideological (as illustrated by the destructive reforms approved last year) than physical.

As Sherlock Holmes said, “When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.”