Behind Mexico’s controversial judicial overhaul
The Take
Al Jazeera
4.7 • 749 Ratings
🗓️ 17 September 2024
⏱️ 13 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Mexico is shaking up its judicial system by moving from appointed judges to ones chosen through elections. Supporters say this will clean up corruption and make judges more accountable to the public. But critics worry that electing judges could lead to political influence and weaken their independence. What’s at stake for Mexicans?
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In this episode:
- Julia Galiano (@juliagaliano), Journalist
Episode credits:
This episode was produced by Khaled Soltan, Chloe K. Li and Hagir Saleh with Hisham Abu Salah, Duha Mosaad, Shraddha Joshi and our host Natasha Del Toro, in for Malika Bilal.
Our sound designer is Alex Roldan. Our lead of audience development and engagement is Aya Elmileik. Munera Al Dosari and Adam Abou-Gad are our engagement producers.
Alexandra Locke is The Take’s executive producer. Ney Alvarez is Al Jazeera's head of audio.
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@AJEPodcasts on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Threads and YouTube
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Al Jazeera Podcasts. |
| 0:07.0 | Today, a major overhaul to Mexico's judiciary has just passed, despite massive protests. |
| 0:18.0 | Senators voted in favor of a constitutional reform |
| 0:21.8 | under which Mexicans would elect judges |
| 0:23.8 | at all levels of government by popular vote. |
| 0:27.3 | Will these reforms help fight corruption |
| 0:29.8 | or make the country's problems worse? |
| 0:34.3 | I'm Natasha del Toro, and this is the take. |
| 0:40.3 | This was a scene last week in Mexico's Senate chamber. |
| 0:50.3 | Protesters stormed the chamber to try and stop a controversial law from passing. |
| 0:57.1 | The law was pushed by outgoing President Lopez Obrador and will remake the country's judiciary. |
| 1:06.1 | What we want to do is correct and disappear corruption. Above all, at the top level, judges and justices. |
| 1:15.6 | Not all, but many of them let organized crime figures and white-collar criminals go free. |
| 1:22.6 | Judges who were appointed will now be elected by popular vote. The change will affect all |
| 1:29.3 | levels of the country's roughly 7,000 judges, from the cheap justice of the Supreme Court |
| 1:34.6 | down to those at local courts who will now be required to run for office. Joining me to talk |
| 1:40.7 | about all this is Julia Galliano, a freelance journalist based in Mexico City. |
| 1:48.0 | So, Julia, you've been seeing major protests happening. |
| 1:53.0 | Maybe just really quickly, what's the scene on the ground? What's been happening? |
| 1:57.0 | Yeah, it's been a fairly tumultuous couple of weeks leading up to the approval and signature of this reform into law. |
| 2:05.6 | Basically, this has been a reform champion by the president, Andres Manuel Lóbrador. |
| 2:10.6 | He has been very open about it, how important it is to him and to his government. |
... |
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