To be or not to be. That is the question of Ricardo Monreal. To be or not to be with Morena. Follow or not follow the instructions issued from the National Palace. The arrival in the Senate of “Plan B” of the electoral reform of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, after the Chamber of Deputies approved the bill early Wednesday morning, has once again put the leader of the Morenista majority on the ropes. While the president and a faction of Morena in the Senate have urged him to dispatch the ratification of the reform in the upper house as soon as possible, the opposition parties of the Va por Mexico alliance are waiting for Monreal to organize a vote that reject it, or at least delay its processing until the next regular session of Congress, in the first half of 2023. Both parties expect a definition from the Zacatecan politician. Is this his litmus test? “Every day I am subjected to trials by fire. This is one more”, the Morenista said at a press conference.
Monreal plays chess and doesn’t want to take a false step. The board is the uncertain political future of him. His next move will incline him towards one of the two sides of destiny that the same game holds: continue in Morena in search of the presidential candidacy, with all the internal anti-democracy and the dirty war that he has denounced, or continue negotiating his candidacy with the PAN. , PRI, PRD and Citizen Movement. His best ally -the political game demands it- is time. He himself is not in a hurry and keeps the two parties on edge as they watch him move the pieces.
The Morenista leader, who in turn is the president of the Senate’s Political Coordination Board – the body where the parliamentary heads of all the parties weave agreements – has said for now that he will not allow the bill to be dispatched in the Chamber registration with a waiver of paperwork, that is, without it being reviewed in legislative committees before it is turned over to the plenary for a vote, as the Chamber of Deputies did early Wednesday morning, in a maneuver of fast track that made possible the majority vote of Morena and her allies from the Green Party and the Labor Party.
Monreal has indicated that the Senate commissions will evaluate the reforms sent by San Lazaro and that next week the discussion will take place in plenary session. This, however, could not happen if the commissions are not called to session or if they prolong the analysis of the minutes. The ordinary period of sessions ends next Thursday, December 15. “The rhythm of the deliberation will be set by the commissions, with full autonomy and freedom. So you have to wait. If it is in a few days, in a few weeks, they are going to set the pace that the deliberation generates and, where appropriate, the approval of the opinion, to submit it to the plenary session,” declared the leader of Morena in the Senate.
The route outlined by Monreal is closer to the requests of the opposition than to the desires of his own bench, where he is facing an internal rebellion. The coordinators of the PAN, PRI, PRD, MC and the so-called Plural Group –in which there are senators without a party– requested on Wednesday that the ruling on “plan B” be postponed until the next regular session, which begins in February 2023. In the Va por Mexico alliance they are attentively watching the next step of Monreal. “We hope that it is consistent with the defense positions of democratic institutions. Today, more than partisan colors or loyalties to the president and to a project that has done a lot of damage to the country, Monreal’s main loyalty must be with the homeland and with the defense of democracy. We believe that the definition you take is very important. We hope you will side with the citizens and make a consistent decision. And, of course, his decision will have a very important value in the construction of scenarios towards 2024 ″, one of the negotiating leaders of Va por Mexico has declared to this newspaper.
On the other hand, Monreal has received pressure so that Lopez Obrador’s electoral reforms are ruled on – and approved – before December 15. The Morenista leader revealed that there was an attempt to have them voted on the same Wednesday, as soon as the upper house formally received them from San Lazaro. “It was not accepted fast track. yesterday’s pressure [miercoles] it was that everything was approved yesterday; and I, as president of the Political Coordination Board, did not accept that it be carried out in a hasty manner, without analysis, just a vote, without knowing the content of the opinions, ”he said. The negotiations came from the Secretary of the Interior, Adan Augusto Lopez, Lopez Obrador’s main political operator and also a presidential candidate for Morena. “I have been talking with him about the issue of the reform, that they want it to come out as quickly as possible,” Monreal has revealed.
To the pressures of the head of the Interior have been added those of the Morena faction in the Senate, which is adverse to its coordinator and which is headed by Citlalli Hernandez, general secretary of Morena, and Cesar Cravioto, who was a collaborator of Sheinbaum in the capital government. Legislative sources from Morena confirmed to this newspaper that the faction did ask Monreal to vote on “Plan B” on Wednesday. “Several senators asked that progress be made as soon as possible, since we are two sessions away from the end of the period,” said a legislator consulted. “The conditions of the group are to push for it to leave in this period,” said another senator.
Monreal’s zigzagging in recent weeks has raised warnings within Morena that he could be removed from party coordination in the Senate, a scenario that could end up sending him to the opposition side. He runs the game time and his turn to pull runs out.
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