by Xia Lin, Wu Hao
MEXICO CITY, May 23 (Xinhua) -- Mexico has intensified its clampdown on corruption with a two-pronged strategy, which combines the arrest of corrupt officials with a nationwide anti-corruption mechanism.
The efforts are a continuation of two arrests in April of fugitive former governors in Italy and Guatemala, respectively, and a manifestation of the country's resolve to root out corruption crimes like political nepotism and collusion with drug cartels, which have plagued Mexico for a long time.
"Mexico has been establishing its national anti-corruption system to coordinate investigation and punishment. The graft-beating agencies are trained to carry out laws and stipulations accurately, so that they can find legal support anytime necessary," said Marcos Fernandez, professor at Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education.
Starting from July 2016, all government employees are asked to list their assets, and auditing agencies have become capable of tracking financial transactions at state levels.
Manuel Quijano, a political science lecturer at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, told Xinhua that the anti-corruption mechanism should be established on the basis of transparency and accountability.
Local supervision and audits should be independent from governors; citizens should be enabled to participate in anti-graft battles by submitting evidence of nepotism, cronyism and negligence of duty against corrupt officials at state or provincial levels, he added.
FORMER GOVERNORS DETAINED OVER CORRUPTION CHARGES
Tomas Yarrington, former governor of the state of Tamaulipas, was arrested in Italy in April. He was accused in 2013 by a federal grand jury in Texas, the United States, of taking millions of dollars in bribes from the Gulf Cartel and other drug traffickers. He now faces charges in both Mexico and the United States and will be prosecuted by U.S. authorities first.
In a separate case also in April, Javier Duarte, former governor of the state of Veracruz, was arrested in Guatemala. He was accused of money laundering, owning overseas assets and illegal properties, as well as colluding with drug cartels involved in the killings of journalists. He has denied all accusations.
According to Fernandez, nepotism is rampant in some Latin American countries. "Official posts were allocated among friends and family members. Various interests are passed around to feed factions or win polls," he said, while criticizing the country's media for failing to fulfill their responsibilities of supervision.
Quijano, for his part, attributed corruption to nearly two decades of lax supervision by the Interior Ministry, the Treasury Ministry and the Senate.
"Cliques and lobbies have been generated ever since, and those who had won polls had no intention to improve efforts to fight corruption," Quijano said, while calling for public participation in anti-corruption campaigns.
WEIGHING INVESTMENT AND POLITICS
In addition, Fernandez said corruption had "stemmed and even nipped" the confidence of foreign investors and infringed on public resources, which has directly dragged down the country's socio-economic development.
According to the reports of the Mexican Institute of Competitive Power Research, annual gross domestic products of the country were chiseled off by five percent due to graft.
Politics also played a role. Both Yarrington and Duarte are members of the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), and Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has labeled the arrests as his cabinet's "determined and powerful signal to deal with corruption."
Analysts thus believe the PRI's anti-corruption campaign is aimed at polishing its image ahead of next year's local and general elections.
