OAS ANTI-CORRUPTION MECHANISM ADOPTS MEXICO REPORT

Within the Framework of the Fourth Round, the Committee of Experts of the MESICIC, during its Twentieth Meeting, held from September 10 to 14, 2012, adopted the report on Mexico by consensus, following a careful examination of the information provided by that country, as well as that gathered during an on-site visit carried out from March 21 to 23 of this year by a review subgroup composed of Canada and Peru, with the support of the General Secretariat of the OAS.  At that on-site visit, meetings were held with Mexican authorities as well as with representatives of civil society organizations, the private sector, professional associations, academics and researchers. The following aspects of the report should be highlighted:

First, recommendations were formulated to Mexico for its consideration, with respect to the oversight bodies selected by Mexico to be examined in the Fourth Round, as follows:

Civil Service Secretariat (SFP) and Internal Oversight Organs (OICs): strengthening inter-institutional coordination; agreeing on mutual cooperation activities in areas where interest in offering and receiving such cooperation has been expressed; overcoming the OICs’ difficulties with the internal legal framework of the agencies under their jurisdiction, with following up on the recommendations served on those agencies, and with the lack of an established culture of respect for and protection of public assets and interests.

Office of the Senior Auditor of the Federation (ASF): strengthening inter-institutional coordination; streamlining the taking of decisions in relation to the administrative responsibility punishment processes carried out by the ASF; speeding up the conclusion, by the competent authority, of preliminary investigations into complaints formulated by the ASF; speeding up the conclusion of the redress procedures initiated by the ASF and the recovery, by the Federal Treasury, of the funds arising from the liabilities for property damages established by the ASF.

Office of the Attorney General of the Republic (PGR): speeding up the issuing of the regulatory provisions of the Professional Service of the Ministerial, Police, and Expert Career; ensuring the enforcement of the protocols for preparing preliminary inquiries, criminal trials, and constitutional relief applications; resolving the difficulties in implementing the “Risk Administration Strategy”; strengthening the units responsible for the criminal investigation and prosecution of acts of corruption; preventing staff rotation programs from affecting proper fulfillment of this function; and concluding implementation of the “Program of Effective Justice for All” project.

Federal Judicature Council (CJF): adopting a regulation to fill, through merit-based competition, the CJF’s middle-management and operational positions that are not covered by the Judicial Career regime; establishing a technological platform for analyzing data from statements of net worth submitted electronically, in such a way as to produce indicators for investigations into possible irregularities; increasing the number of studies into changes in net worth; and concluding the updating of the CJF’s organizational and procedural manuals.

Second, as a result of the follow-up to the recommendations formulated to Mexico in the First Round, the Committee made a determination as to those which still have to be considered, including, among others, those aimed at the following purposes: adopting a system to evaluate and monitor compliance by the federal public administration’s with the obligation of adopting a Code of Conduct; guaranteeing the sustainability of training and dissemination programs related to provisions on the obligation to report acts of corruption, and adopting protective measures for those who report such acts; regulating the disclosure of statements of net worth and optimizing their analysis so they are of use in detecting conflicts of interest; and ensuring that departments and agencies comply with the obligations that regulate the right of access to information and that they identify, publish, and disseminate socially useful or focused information.

The report also summarizes the progress made in the implementation of those recommendations, including, the Federal Anticorruption in Public Procurement Law, in relation to anonymous whistleblowing and the confidentiality of the identity of the whistleblower; the Federal Archive Law, in relation to access to public information; the strengthening of the verification of the contents of statements of net worth, through the intelligent computer tools known as the Alert System and OMEXT and the Equity Evolution Procedure; and a considerable increase in Federal Public Administration programs with social control schemes.

In addition to the foregoing, the report highlights the best practices with respect to which Mexico provided information, which in summary, refer to the SFP’s strategy for detecting corrupt public officials in flagrante; an SFP strategy for timely, automatic identification of possible substantial, unjustified in public servants’ net worth; a system for real-time monitoring of contracting events, in the PEMEX–PETROQUÍMICA OIC; and a PGR project to reduce the margins for discretion and interpretation and to increase mechanisms for accountability and transparency in the actions of agents of the Public Prosecution Service of the Federation.

During this Twentieth Meeting, similar reports were adopted for Brazil, El Salvador, Bolivia and Paraguay. The Mexican report adopted by the Committee, as well as the aforementioned countries, are available at: http://www.oas.org/juridico/english/mesicic4_rep.htm