Gómez Mont Speaks

Milenio published a long interview with Fernando Gómez Mont yesterday that offered no shockers but covered some interesting ground. Highlights:

Just a few days from the meeting of the National Security Council, in a strong tone with any runaround, Gómez Mont clearly affirmed that "purifying the police doesn't address only the corrupt [cop], also the coward. But that goes toward the end result of those who make up these forces having the right to personal honor and security. That's the reconstruction that we are carrying out".

How are you confronting groups that work on the margin of the institutions, para-police groups...? What is to be done about them?
It's very simple, the difference between organized crime and the institutions. The difference lies in that the state can offer their agents a life project, honor for the agents and security for their families.

When they opt for the clandestine route to confront this supposed risk, the possibility that these types of groups tomorrow start to operate in the same way as organized crime only increases. That is not nor will it be the solution and it's a fact. And I mean that the genesis of the security problem in Mexico was when from the seat of power they wanted this type of undercover operations. The deinstitutionalization of the state's security forces was the primordial responsibility of those who operated the state. That path has no future and that path is a source of risk, and we are investigating if it exists. He who is hailed as a hero today will be a villain tomorrow. Simply because he's acting on the edge of the law.

Because if you can't continue the service carried out with honor and with security and tranquility for your family, you simply are headed for the paranoid path of secrecy.

Do you have the social base of drug trafficking measured?
The social base does exist, linked to criminal organizations, it's a function of precariousness, with development the incentives disappear. But nobody should question: first comes security as the preeminent goal as a budget so that the other goals can be reached. He who wants to achieve a security solution with just social or economic policies is playing the role of the naïf or useful idiot.

In regard to the Mexican army in the streets, what is the plan for ending the deployment? Or will they continue in this role despite the possibility that in the long term the image of the military is damaged?
In some zones where the institutional weakening has been grave, the army has had a more significant role. But the logic is that the institutions of public security function and the army will continue to have a more discreet role in this task as the institutions of administration and criminal justice and criminal prevention grow stronger. Congress, after a conscientious debate, has continued creating tools for this purpose.

The stuff about para-police groups was interesting in that I've not heard much comment on that at all, but it was discussed as though it were a significant challenge. Which it may well be.

One last point: Gómez Mont is often mentioned as a potential PAN presidential candidate. If that's to be, he could stand to speak more directly. Much of this interview was Kerry-esque, almost obfuscatory. It didn't seem like it was willfully so, but rather a product of his speaking style.