Key Points
- Elections may be vulnerable to organised crime: Margaret Satterthwaite
- Hundreds of opponents of reforms marched through Mexico City
- Elections would politicise the justice system: Experts
MEXICO CITY, Mexico: Mexicans elect their judges Sunday in unprecedented elections that sharply divided opinion in a country plagued by rampant crime, corruption and impunity.
The government and its supporters said the reform making Mexico the world’s only nation to elect all of its judges and magistrates by popular vote was needed to clean up a rotten justice system, according to AFP.
Arturo Giesemann, a 57-year-old retiree, said his main motivation for voting was “the disgust I have with the current judiciary because of its corruption.”
Turnout appeared to be low as many voters struggled to choose from hundreds of largely unknown candidates.
“We are not very prepared,” said Lucia Calderon, a 63-year-old university teacher. “I think we need more information.”
In the western state of Jalisco, 63-year-old housewife Maria Estrada said she used her “intuition” as she did not know the candidates, according to Bloomberg.
Politicising justice system
Experts were concerned that the elections would politicise the justice system and make it easier for criminals to influence the courts with threats and bribery.
While corruption already exists, “there is reason to believe that elections may be more easily infiltrated by organised crime than other methods of judicial selection,” AFP cited Margaret Satterthwaite, the United Nations special rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers as saying.
Hundreds of opponents of the reforms marched through Mexico City waving flags and banners with slogans including: “Hands off our democracy” and “No to electoral fraud.”
The elections send the judiciary “to its grave,” said Ismael Novela, a 58-year-old company worker.
“It was the last counterweight we had against the totalitarianism of the executive branch.”
President’s message
President Claudia Sheinbaum hit back at her critics on the eve of the vote.
“Those who want the regime of corruption and privileges in the judiciary to continue say this election is rigged. Or they also say it’s so a political party can take over the Supreme Court,” she said in a video message.
“Nothing could be further from the truth,” she insisted.
The run-up to the vote was not accompanied by the kind of violence that often targets politicians in Mexico.
But “it is logical that organised criminal groups would have approached judges and candidates who are important to them,” said consultant Luis Carlos Ugalde, a former head of Mexico’s electoral commission.
Rights group Defensorxs has identified around 20 candidates it considers “high risk,” including Silvia Delgado, a former lawyer for Sinaloa Cartel co-founder Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.
Another aspiring judge, in Durango state, spent almost six years in prison in the United States for drug crimes.
Good reputation
Voters were tasked with choosing around 880 federal judges – including Supreme Court justices – as well as hundreds of local judges and magistrates. Another election for the remainder will be held in 2027.
Candidates are supposed to have a law degree, experience in legal affairs and what is termed “a good reputation,” as well as no criminal record.
Corruption in judicial system
To do a good job, voters “would have to spend hours and hours researching the track record and the profiles of each of the hundreds of candidates,” said David Shirk, a professor at the University of San Diego.
He believes that most of the corruption in Mexico’s judicial system is in law enforcement agencies and public prosecutor offices.
“If you can avoid being prosecuted, you don’t have to worry about the judge,” said Shirk, who heads the Justice in Mexico research project.
The judicial reforms were championed by Sheinbaum’s predecessor and mentor Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who frequently clashed with the courts before stepping down last year, according to Reuters.
The main reason for the elections seems to be “because Lopez Obrador had a grudge against the judges,” Shirk claimed.
![NEW YORK: Pakistan's former Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, leading Pakistan’s high-level parliamentary delegation, on Tuesday warned that India's aggressive actions pose a serious threat to peace in South Asia and urged the international community to take note of India's aggressive conduct. Bilawal was addressing a press conference at the United Nations headquarters in New York on recent regional developments after the military conflict between India and Pakistan. The Pakistani delegation is in New York to present Pakistan’s stance on the military escalation with India and to challenge New Delhi’s narrative at the global level. The visit is part of Pakistan’s sustained diplomatic outreach to brief key UN stakeholders on the alarming regional situation. The Pakistani delegation is also scheduled to arrive in Washington today, where it plans to engage with Secretary of State Marco Rubio, other senior officials, lawmakers, and think tanks till June 6. The team will also visit London and Brussels. Speaking at the press conference, Bilawal said that he wanted to use the opportunity to share Pakistan’s perspective on the recent military conflict with India in the wake of the Pahalgam attack and the way forward. Bilawal said that the “illegal strikes” launched by India as part of its ‘Operation Sindoor’ were “in violation of the UN Charter, international law”. He said the attacks had targeted civilian infrastructure, places of worship, energy infrastructure and innocent women and children. He said India had used the April 22 terrorist attack in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir’s (IIOJK) Pahalgam as a pretext to launch the attack inside Pakistan. Following the Pahalgam incident, Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif offered publicly to India that Pakistan was ready to be part of any impartial international investigation into this attack. “We did so because we were confident, our hands were clean and we had nothing to do with this terrorist attack. “We expressed our sympathy with the victims of terrorism and Pakistan has consistently and unequivocally condemned terrorism in all its forms and manifestations,” he said, adding that PM Sharif had immediately expressed Pakistan’s willingness to India and the global community to be part of any impartial international investigation. “Indian government refused Pakistan's offer and chose instead to conduct their illegal strikes. Pakistan only then acted in self-defence, we never initiated any violence against India,” Bilawal said. Bilawal emphasised that Pakistan never initiated hostilities against India but responded to Indian aggression by downing six Indian fighter jets. "The Pakistani military had responded with precision the night of the first Indian attack and only targeted and downed six planes because we believed those were the ones to release their load on Pakistan”. He stated that US President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio played a vital role in achieving a ceasefire during heightened tensions between the nuclear-armed South Asian neighbours. “We’ve seen during the course of this conflict how quickly the escalation ladder between our two countries rose and the concern is that the next time there is such an incident, there may not be time for the international community to intervene before things get a lot worse. That is why it is absolutely important for Pakistan and the international community to continue to pursue dialogue and diplomacy as the only viable path to peace.” He said Pakistan’s position was to hold a “comprehensive dialogue” with India that would include the issue of terrorism as well. The head of the Pakistani delegation said that no civilized nation can support the use of water as a weapon and urged the international community to play its part, questioning, "What would be the global reaction if someone’s lifeline was cut off?" He stressed that Pakistan has paid a heavy price in the fight against terrorism and has suffered the most. “The single largest number of terrorist attacks that take place in any one country is Pakistan. The single largest number of victims of terrorism is Pakistan. I myself have suffered at the hands of terrorists. My mother [Benazir Bhutto] was assassinated by the terrorists.” Bilawal also criticised India for targeting water reservoirs and civilian areas, including mosques, during its attacks. Calling negotiations the only path to peace, Bilawal reiterated that the unresolved Kashmir dispute remains the root cause of regional instability. He urged the global community to take notice of India’s aggressive conduct.](https://wenewsenglish.com/storage/2025/06/Bilawal-Bhutto-Zardari-300x180.jpg)
